Recently one of my friends came to stay in our very small spare room for two months while her flat was being refurbished. On her last evening with us she gave us a present to say thank you for having her. The present was small and flat and wrapped in expensive-looking gold paper with matching ribbon. We ripped off the paper to find a crisp white envelope. Inside the envelope was a card containing a gift voucher for Afternoon Tea with Champagne at Fortnum & Mason, the luxury department store on Piccadilly. Despite it being a famously English tradition, the closest we had ever come to having Afternoon Tea was a cuppa and a scone so we were quite excited to find out what it was all about. We thanked my friend very much and phoned to make our reservations.
Two weeks later we arrived at Fortnum & Mason in our finest Sunday clothes and made our way past the extortionately-priced boxes of chocolates and biscuits up to the St James restaurant on the fourth floor, clutching our gift voucher tightly. The lift doors opened into a beautiful room where a pianist was playing and the air smelled of freshly cut flowers. A smartly dressed waitress took us to our table and handed us each a menu displaying the largest selection of teas I had ever seen. We made our choices and within seconds the champagne arrived. Next came a three-tiered plate stand containing delicate salmon and cucumber sandwiches (crust-less, of course), tiny scones with clotted cream and jam and an empty plate on the top. We were about to sample the sandwiches when another waiter arrived carrying a silver tray laden with the most amazing miniature cakes for us to choose from. We chose two each and the waiter placed them on the empty plate at the top of the tiered stand. The tea was poured and we sat back comfortably in our chairs to take it all in.
As we looked around the room and listened to the quiet hum of conversation we noticed that we were the only English people there. The tables were full of American, Russian, French and Japanese tourists and the staff spoke quietly to each other in Polish and Portuguese. We soon realised that we too were tourists in our own way.
When the last crumbs were eaten and the final drop of tea drunk, we handed over our voucher and made our way back downstairs and outside onto the street. We walked down Piccadilly away from Green Park towards the Eros statue and then turned right onto the Haymarket. The calm serenity of the St James restaurant had been well and truly replaced by the hustle and bustle of central London on a weekend afternoon. Shoppers scurried from sale to sale, bags full of bargains in hand. Taxis honked their horns and buses fought with cyclists for space on the road. Teenagers laughed and shouted to one another across the street and a man we recognised from a TV comedy show walked past carrying a baby on his back. As we got to our bus stop the heavens opened and the rain came pouring down. For us, it was a typically English afternoon in London and we loved it.