Foam

I would've considered myself a borderline nomad in the summer of 2012. During my freshman year of college, my parents decided to leave New Zealand, my home, and begin a life in Denmark via London.

Their plan was to first live in London for a few months before eventually moving across to the Scandinavian country.

By the time I arrived to London in the summer, my mum had already moved onto Denmark to find a job and place to live whilst my Dad continued to work in London, living on the top floor of a family friend's house in Clapham. The house was three floors, my dad and I each had our own bedroom and shared a bathroom on the second floor with the rest of the family.

I remember looking out the window of my bedroom from which I could see the London eye as well as Big Ben. I had three months in London, three whole months to keep myself occupied in one of the largest and most condensed cities in the world. Zero job, zero money, zero friends and zero idea how to get around.

The first three weeks were rough, I struggled to find any job, mostly through my lack of initiative to actually get out there and find it. I believed the best way would be to go through the online hiring sites and just apply to as many as I could. This infuriated my mum and at one point when she came over to visit my dad and I for a few days, she told me I couldn’t come home until I has asked at least two places, face to face, if they were hiring or not.

I did… and eventually came home but continued to hide behind my computer screen.

My resume wasn’t anything special, so I directed my job search towards restaurants and pubs. After another week of not hearing back and with my summer continuing to remain jobless, I finally heard back from a restaurant slash pub called The Blue Anchor. They asked me to come in for a trial shift.

The Blue Anchor was located in Chancery Lane, a small road right in the heart of the legal district of London. Divided by two floors, I walked through the main door and down a set of stairs where I was greeted by the manager, Kendra.

“Hello mate” she said.

I replied

“You’re a fucking kiwi”. (New Zealand)

A little shocked at what I had just said, she started to laugh, and responded with a, “yeah”.

We walked back upstairs to the second bar where I met another employee named Bianca.

Another. Fucking. Kiwi.

Granted that their are a lot of kiwis that work in London, I was still shocked, and as the sweat marks under my arms continued to flow, I was made a lot less nervous with fact that I was in the presence of some countrywoman. I met one other employee, a polish girl called Magda and the three of us showed me around. After an hour, they told me that if I wanted to the job, it was mine.

As I got on the bus delighted with my new status of employment, I reminded myself that I had zero experience with customer service, zero idea how to pour a pint, zero idea how how to make a mix drink and zero idea how to wait tables.

I had my very first shift the next day.

I was completely rocked with anxiety at having to face real people and pour them a lager. On the bus I watched a YouTube tutorial on how to pour a pint successfully, without creating too much foam and having the perfect head (foam at the top of a freshly poured lager).

Its quite hard to practise pouring a pint because its something you cant do over and over again. Lager is expensive. The only way to succeed was to fail. I failed miserably before I become an expert.

You never forget your first customer and on my first shift, it was a lawyer ordering a pint of Amsterdam's finest, Heineken. I semi confidently grabbed the Heineken glass and pulled it up to the the Heineken tap. As the Youtube video instructed instructed, I tilted the glass at a 45 degree and and pulled the lever on the tap down gently, allowing the lager to pour gently down the glass on order to create as little foam at the bottom as possible.

As the beer poured down and begin to fill about half the glass was already filled with foam and very little beer.

I poured the foam away a began again. The same.

One more time. Even more foam.

Foam

Foam

Eventually I handed my customer over to Magda.

You never forget your first successful pint. And it would be in my second ever shift. The beer that that had this pleasure would be Kronenbourg 1664. I was ecstatic.

It was exactly like riding a bike, once you learnt how to pour a pint, you never forgot.

It was a skill that I somewhat cherish and associate with that summer. A summer which turned out to be one of the best.