I WONDER . . . if you can buy kids
over the Internet, shouldn't you be able to sell them, too? To this end, I have set up my own Internet site
totallyfedupmum.co.uk/dot/com/online/hair net — where I have already posted the first notice. It goes: 'For sale. One eight-year-old boy. Quite good condition when washed, which isn't often. admittedly. Would come with own PlayStation, if only we were nice enough to let him have one, but we're not. Not a fussy eater. Although, that said, he did go to his friend Tim's for tea the other day. -What did you have?" I asked when he got back. "Lasagne," he said. "I didn't know you liked lasagne," I said, "I love it," he said. Two days later I make lasagne. "Whassat?" he asks, "Lasagne," I say. "But I hate lasagne," he says. "You said you had it at Tim's and loved it!" I say. "Oh," he says, "but I only like Tim's mother's lasagne. Can I have an egg? And chips?" Hurry, while stocks last. Cost: nothing, inc. p&p. No animals have been harmed in the construction of this site, although I did just throw a tennis ball at the cat, just for the hell of it, and because she's a big, fat lazy thing who gets on my nerves. Does that count?'
Anyway, I thought that before the offers came flooding in — which they'll undoubtedly do because my son is very cute and winsome and well turned-out in acid-coloured polyester football kits or brilliantly vile pyjamas with someone called Taz' on them — I'd take him out for a family farewell meal at a Turkish restaurant that some friends have declared a 'real find' in Dalston. Yes, yes, I know. A 'real find' and `Dalston' don't really go together, do they? Not that I don't like Dalston with its 'Everything for a Pound' shops and chicken places called 'The Jerk Joint' — always the sign of a classy establishment — and vast, sprawling council estates where the people are poor because they've spent all their money on satellite telly and frozen chicken dinners from Iceland. Look at me, going on as if I were posh! Now look at me, going on as if I weren't posh! Well, I am posh, actually. I was brought up in Hampstead Garden Suburb where, if your front hedge wasn't just so, retired majors would storm up shouting, 'I didn't fight in the war so you could neglect your hedge.' I'm afraid to say I now neglect my own front hedge rather badly. Indeed, I recently got a letter from 'The Islington Street Officer' to tell me that it's now taking up so much pavement that it 'represents a danger to blind people'. Golly, I was mortified and wrote back immediately. saying, 'Has it ever occurred to you that blind people might represent a danger to my hedge? In fact, I had to pull two out yesterday. What are you going to do about that?' I think they saw what they were up against. I think they've now closed the file. So, off we go to Dalston, in the car, with the doors locked from inside and my handbag under the seat, just in case anyone going out for more frozen chicken dinners from Iceland gets any ideas. We talk about religion on the way. Truly, we do. My son has just started doing RE at school and he's interested in it. 'I'm Jewish because you are, aren't I, Mum?' he asks. Yes. I tell him. 'So has my penis been criticised then?' Urn . . . no, I say. Although your father's has, often. 'Ha-bloody-ha,' goes his father (nervously). My son continues, 'Can I get it criticised when I got older, then?' I expect so. I tell him. 'Oh, good,' he says. Honestly, he can be extremely lovable sometimes. Shall I keep him? Shall I? Nah. I'm just being a silly, sentimental old fool. Think of the trouble I went to over the lasagne and everything. Plus, I'm not particularly sure I want to be around if and when his penis is criticised. frankly.
We get to the restaurant — Mangal, it's called — which is not only in Dalston but in a very dark side street in Dalston. I can't say for sure, but I suspect it's the sort of street where if someone was walking their dog, that dog would be called Tyson. Mangal doesn't look good. It looks like a kebab shop. Worse, it looks like a horrid kebab shop. You know, all imitation teak, Formica table-tops and dreadful framed 1973 travel posters of home, including one of a woman sitting on a donkey in a field of sheep. However, there are some good signs. too. A large portion of the place is taken up by a big, open, stone grill where everything is cooked to order, including the bread. Plus it's only 7 p.m., but already busy. More, quite a few of the customers are Turkish. More, it's busy even though it doesn't have a licence. (You have to bring your own booze.) I'm all for places without licences, actually, because, to make money they have to make it on the food, and to make it on the food they have to shift one hell of a lot of it, and to shift one hell of a lot of it they've got to make it very good at very good prices, haven't they?
Anyway, we meet our friends, who have three children and are very interested in my site. They might even, they say, do a 'buytwo-get-one-free' offer. Yes, they would throw in their youngest son for nothing, which is jolly good of them considering, as his mother puts it, he recently blew his nose on my sleeve, while I was wearing it'. They could deliver, they say. They might even insist upon it.
We sit beneath the poster of the woman on the donkey surrounded by sheep and decide to go Italy for our holidays this year. I'm not quite sure how Mangal works. There doesn't seem to be a menu or anything. 'What can we have?' we ask. 'Lamb, chicken, vegetarian. . 'we are told. I'm sure there's a lot more on offer, too, but as this is our first time we decide this will do. So some of us order lamb, and some chicken, and some vegetarian. I go for vegetarian. I see the vegetables (great plump aubergines, great plump tomatoes) going on to the grill. I expect them ultimately to be served up as a kebab thing, but they're not. Instead, once the vegetables are cooked, they're whipped off to the kitchen where they are mashed up with tons of garlic. The resulting dish has the texture of steak tartare. And it's abso-bloodylutely delicious, especially when eaten with the freshly baked, piping-hot bread that just keeps coming and coming. (The lamb and chicken, which do come as kebabs, are totally tip-top, too; and served with brilliantly substantial salads.) So, yes, Mangal is very much a 'find'. It cost £54 for the eight of us — including Turkish coffee and a pudding so sweet my teeth are still screaming — which represents excellent value in anyone's book. Anyway, can't hang about. Got my site to work on. I wonder, would my son sell me if he got the chance? 'No, Mummy. I love you too much, Mummy,' he says. Only joking! He says, 'Would I get to keep the money?' Bump! Crash! Help! Oh bugger. There goes another blind person to rescue. Honestly, why don't they just look where they're going?
Mangal, 10 Arcola Street, London E8 (020 7275 8981).
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