Lee and I had exchanged numbers at the Embassy Lunar Party, and he had texted me on the Friday night about a custom wallet I had ordered at his factory. We decided to meet up briefly for bubble tea so he could give me the wallet (in exchange for some home made cookies). Somehow bubble tea turned into a weekend long date (sort of) and although unexpected, probably one of the best weekend’s I’ve had in a while!
Although I come on MFC on Friday nights, I needed a reason to actually leave the house for a bit, and I wanted to check on my friend who works in Chinatown market. Lee was in Soho when he texted me about the wallet and it worked out very easy to just meet for bubble tea. My favourite place is Hong Kong Diner because they make it out of fresh fruits (they blend it up smoothie style) and not just flavoured powder. We met and it was all very casual. It’s funny because I had only spoken to him briefly at the Embassy party a month ago, and we exchanged numbers on a (almost purely) business basis.
Meeting up started out a bit like a business meeting too. We sat down, ordered our tea (Mango for me, since there was no more watermelon, and matcha for him) and I asked about his work. He lives half in London and half in Leicester. In fact, he had driven 3 hours that day just to get back to London. We talked about the merchandise that he makes, and he gave me the wallet which is beautiful and very cool. Then he showed me a wallet concept he had come up with. I instantly saw the potential of it as a wide commercial product, and we spent the next hour talking branding.
So far, not a date right? Just two people meeting up, talking business ideas. Just to make it clear, I don’t want to work for him. I just enjoy talking about those things. Then, I said I had to go home (because of course I came on MFC that night!) and he offered to give me a lift home, only he had to pop by a bar to say hello to a friend quickly. I didn’t mind that because the bus home on a Friday night isn’t the most fun thing, and it would have taken over and hour anyway. We go to the bar and meet his friend who is a nice guy that does marketing. So in my head it’s still all about business.
We decide to meet up the next day to talk more about the new wallet concept. I was really interested in seeing the physical product, rather than just the conceptual designs. As it turned out, that Friday night I managed to catch no sleep at all, and so met Lee the next day at Tower bridge very tired. We walked around the docks, before going to Cafe Rouge for lunch. Over lunch he showed me the product and we spent even more time playing around with it, and coming up with more ideas to market it. I ordered a burger, since they seem to be my current obsession. It wasn’t that nice.
Robocop somehow came up in our conversation, and as the sunny weather had turned into a rather horrible storm, we decided to go to the cinema and watch it. I’m not sure how that works, but it did. We went to the Cinema, and he bought me some nachos and icecream. I fell asleep half way through the movie, but woke up in time for the climatic fight scene. Overall, the movie wasn’t as good as the original but very hollywood family film. Hmm.
On our way back home, by this time it was 8pm, we passed bt St Paul’s and I mentioned not really seeing it before. We parked up outside and walked around. We then crossed the bridge in front of St Paul’s because I wanted to see the view from this Bridge, at which point we realised the Tate Modern was still open! At 8:30pm? Of course we had to find out what that was about…