If you don’t already know Sidewalk Cafe in Vredehoek you need to head on down there one Saturday and grab a bite because the food is incredible, the vibes are awesome and if you’re lucky enough, Dave will be your waiter and for however long you stay there, life will be about as perfect as it can be.
For us life was as perfect as it could be for about five hours. We rolled into Sidewalk at about 9.30 on Saturday morning, J-Rab, Jennyjenjen, Barbarian, Goff-girl and myself after waking up hungover as hell from our housewarming the night before and marvelling that we were all still alive.
We went to meet up with friends of Goff-Girl’s who were just finishing a scrumptious breakfast of fresh fruit juices, muesli, yoghurt, honey and tea, so naturally we all sat down and ordered a round of beers.
From there the wheels came off completely. By 10.30 we were onto the Bloody Marys and sometime around lunchtime a round of tequilas came out followed by a police van that parked in the street right next to us. We knew we had total immunity as long as we stayed put though so that’s exactly what we did and sooner or later they moved on, all of us smiling and waving at them like a bunch of asylum escapees.
It felt good not to give a shit. It felt good to spend the morning getting loaded at a ridiculously early hour with my friends while other people went jogging up the street or came to Sidewalk in their loafers to enjoy a quaint little meal and saw the chaos that was unfolding at our table.
And all the while, Dave endured. Like some stalwart captain of a ship full of maniacs, he stood his ground because he’d seen this before many, many times and at least we added a random element into his day that he seemed to enjoy.
“I want a big flower for behind my ear,†J-Rab turned around and randomly blurted out as Dave was walking past and I swear to God, the man didn’t even flinch or look surprised or perplexed or off-guard in any conceivable way. He just said “Sure†like it was the most normal request he’d ever heard, walked over to a nearby tree and came back with the perfect flower.
It was good times I tell ya, Sidewalk Cafe gets the Tiger stamp of approval. Go there every day this week and the week after and the week after. Dig the view from the stoep outside and have a Bloody Mary or 10.
Life really doesn’t get much better than that 
-ST
