In Favour of the Matinee

In Favour of the Matinee

In Favour of the Matinee.

As a rule we tend to book evening performances however last week one thing led to another and the next thing you know we are fronting up to a mid week matinee of the ballet at The Coliseum.

The show was brilliant. Young full-on dancers at the peak of their powers giving it their all. Throw in a couple of trained pigeons for the final act and all the punters went home happy.

Now, on to the punters. From the looks of it, these afternoon sessions are geared to an audience of retired ballet lovers.

These elderly punters turned up in hordes. To be honest, I have never seen so many zimmer frames and walking sticks in the same place at the same time.

For many, climbing the stairs into the theatre, then up to the level of the circle must have been something akin to a major obstacle course, however they got there in the end and in high sprits.

I’ve got to give it to the elderly, they are there to enjoy themselves, don’t give a toss about dressing up and simply have that look on their faces that tells you in no uncertain terms that they will dress and behave exactly how they like.

This attitude is frankly quite inspiring.

If our particular performance were held in the evening I would have no doubt that the audience would behave in line with a different set of rules.

However, we were surrounded by any number of individuals with hearing difficulties, which I would have thought would have led to a heap of looking and not much talking.

Talk about wrong on all counts!

For starters, these guys are pretty cunning and as a rule had come armed with torches so they can track down those pesky walking sticks or pieces of clothing if they happen to fall by mistake into another row.

As for talking during the performance, these retirees were spectacular. They simply don’t know how to press the off button and chatted (more like yelled) to each other throughout the three-hour performance. If they saw something on stage that amused them they would laugh out loud and applaud wildly.

We were also constantly bombarded with ribald comments like “ See that one in the black tights, I wouldn’t mind seeing his pegs lying between my sheets “ or “look at that girl on the right, poor thing, she looks like she’s got a gammy leg” or

“ Do you think there’s going to be a break any time soon, my bladder’s killing me.”

Both Julia and yours truly were splitting our sides throughout the performance

What a great afternoon. You have to give it to the English.  

The Crypt

Dinner at The Crypt

Now this was a very interesting dinner organized by Robert Wilson, the owner of The Bleeding Heart restaurant, one of

 London’s top Frog eateries. As an aside Robert and /or The Bleeding Heart also has a 50% cross shareholding in Trinity Wines 

in the Hawkes Bay which means cheap NZ plonk at the restaurant.

Anyway, Robert organized this theme night to be held in the Crypt of St Etheldreda’s church in Ely Place, Clerkenwell, a stones throw from the Bleeding Heart.

The sense of history lies heavy in The Crypt as it’s foundations date back to the 6^th century and the Crypt itself to the 12^th 

century.

The big draw card is that on May 31^st 1531 Henry V111 and his first wife Catherine of Aragon hosted a grand celebration in the Crypt that apparently lasted five full days and nights. They feasted on swans stuffed with larks stuffed with sparrows (show offs!)

The irony here is that at this time good old Henry was moving heaven and earth to give Catherine the flick and on that basis they dined in separate areas for the full five days.

As for the evening it was just great. The atmosphere was electric. The food was sensational and the wines, well the fast-talking and slightly sozzled Andrea Sottimano of the vineyard of the same name, flogged his various reds as if his life depended on it. It was actually quite entertaining watching this chap butcher the English language in yet another attempt to describe the heaven like qualities of his pretty average tasting products.

We didn’t care as we were there for the experience and the theatre of the whole deal.

As for our fellow guests seated at our table.

Well, there were a couple of hard working young Americans who went to great lengths informing us about the ins and outs of a car rental franchise they managed at Heathrow. I know, I know, it’s hard to treat Americans seriously and these guys were no

exception. The couple directly opposite were retired. The guy looked like that English comedian Les Dawson, and having announced that he was strictly a beer drinker, then proceeded to hammer himself legless with heavy reds. His wife was one of

those “horsey” types who once started , couldn’t stop talking about her horses, horses races, and anyone of note related to the

horse flesh industry. Julia kept on telling me to stop egging her on, to no avail. Once this woman had downed a few she fairly

took off like a rocket and no one but no one was going to stop her. I loved that woman she was really a class act.

The final couple was one Robert Lewis, a central London Barrister in his final week of a generally unfulfilling career before retirement, accompanied by his long suffering and very pleasant wife.

I really took to Robert. The guy came out of the blocks firing on all cylinders. He had a really interesting take on everything from food and wine to the current state of the English legal system.

We are halfway through dinner and Robert is in full flight when suddenly he turns to me and says “Do you have any friends “ to which I reply “Yes, and pray why do you ask?”. So Robert then tells me that he doesn’t have any friends, never has, and the

closest thing he probably has to his friend is his weekend cross-country walking buddy, his wife. I didn’t quite know what 

direction the conversation was heading in, so to avoid the possibility of having the guy front up at our front door the following Saturday decked out in anorak, shorts and tramping boots, I immediately informed the wannabe friend that  a) I hated tramping

 and b) suggested that he insure his wife doesn’t pop her clogs anytime soon.

All in all, a great evening.

Oh, before I forget, on the way out the door Robert, the guy from The Bleeding Heart took Julia and I to one side to introduce us

to his wife , a fellow Kiwi who hailed from Rotorua. As we walked away from the Crypt we both agreed that what with her 

strange wig and full length fire red coat, Robert’s wife looked exactly like a human version of that flower the Red Hot Poker.

Geeze, this is an interesting city.

Cheers John.  

The Crypt

Into the second weekWell, hi again. It has been all go, in fact it has been frantic. We kicked off last week with a visit to The Royal Academy to take in a massive David Hockney exhibition, which is causing quite a stir. This show has been sold out months in advance and the only way to get through the front door is to wrap up well and line up half an hour before the doors opened, which we did. It was well worth the big freeze. His paintings were a riot of colour and imagination. He doesn’t mess about when painting these works as he is looking at the big picture. We finished the day with an evening in Soho at Ronnie Scott’s to witness Jack Bruce, ex Cream, a seventy year old genius with attitude, deliver a performance that proves that talent doesn’t expire as the years go past. Hope for us all! The man is a living legend. When he first hit the stage we looked at each and thought ‘ we are the presence of a train wreck’. By the second number his voice kicked in and the years rolled away, the crowd went berserk, Jack fed off the positive vibes and the joint rocked. Wonderful stuff. The following evening took a completely different turn, when we fronted up to see Romeo and Juliet at The Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. The ballet was sublime. However, what really left a lasting impression was the simply stunning building, in particular the bar and restaurant set-up, which is a work of art on a massive scale. The next few days were filled with galleries, museums, pubs and wine bars. All good educational stuff. Last Friday night we drifted down to the Barbican to see a play ‘Tis a Pity She’s a Whore’. This little number dates back to the time of Samuel Pepys who commented at the time that he thought it was a tasteless play performed by sub-standard actors. Well, this latest rendition would have blown his socks off. Full-on mayhem, incest, lust, power, greed, jealousy, you name it…we saw it. There was simply nothing left on the table after the final curtain call. The next day we called in to the Saatchi Gallery off Sloane Square in the vain hope that we might see something to spin our wheels. No such luck. This gallery is still art central disaster. As we strolled back along the Thames towards Pimlico we dived into the grandly named pub ‘The King William IV’. The pub itself was completely forgettable but the location was top draw. We just sat there on a crisp spring afternoon looking directly over the river in the general direction of that brilliant masterpiece of British architecture – The Battersea Power Station. There is no escaping this building; it totally dominates the Pimlico horizon. As an aside, this disused facility last operated in 1983, is currently on the block for the first time in its history with an asking price of UKP500 million. For your money you receive 39.1 acres of prime land, four chimneys and about a billion used bricks. Sunday was a Biggie! Front and centre early afternoon at the Royal Albert Hall to take in the epic opera ‘Aida’. We didn’t quite know what to expect and as novice opera goers we had steeled ourselves to be slightly bored. Wrong! This performance was mind blowing. It was larger than life and packed with action. It’s got us hooked for future operas. To celebrate such a great afternoon we took a diversion on the way home via ‘The Blue Bar’ at The Berkeley in Knightsbridge. What a place, what a bar, atmosphere, real class and prices to match. In fact the receipt for the four Merlots is still glowing 24 hours later as if it’s been dipped in uranium. Today we had a low-key day and toured the Olympic village on an organized walk. It has to be said that the British are very proud of this East London development, and so they should be. Our guide made the point that when people bemoan the 3.5 million pound price tag, they are forgetting that this figure equates to only 1.5 percent of the UK government recent bail out of it’s banking sector. Indications are that this will be a top-notch Olympics and with buildings erected that will be used for generations to come. That’s it. See ya.

Well, hi again.

It has been all go, in fact it has been frantic.

We kicked off last week with a visit to The Royal Academy to take in a massive David Hockney exhibition, which is causing quite a stir. This show has been sold out months in advance and the only way to get through the front door is to wrap up well and line up half an hour before the doors opened, which we did. It was well worth the big freeze. His paintings were a riot of colour and imagination. He doesn’t mess about when painting these works as he is looking at the big picture.

We finished the day with an evening in Soho at Ronnie Scott’s to witness Jack Bruce, ex Cream, a seventy year old genius with attitude, deliver a performance that proves that talent doesn’t expire as the years go past. Hope for us all!

The man is a living legend. When he first hit the stage we looked at each and thought ‘ we are the presence of a train wreck’. By the second number his voice kicked in and the years rolled away, the crowd went berserk, Jack fed off the positive vibes and the joint rocked. Wonderful stuff.

The following evening took a completely different turn, when we fronted up to see Romeo and Juliet at The Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. The ballet was sublime. However, what really left a lasting impression was the simply stunning building, in particular the bar and restaurant set-up, which is a work of art on a massive scale.

The next few days were filled with galleries, museums, pubs and wine bars. All good educational stuff.

Last Friday night we drifted down to the Barbican to see a play ‘Tis a Pity She’s a Whore’. This little number dates back to the time of Samuel Pepys who commented at the time that he thought it was a tasteless play performed by sub-standard actors. Well, this latest rendition would have blown his socks off.

Full-on mayhem, incest, lust, power, greed, jealousy, you name it…we saw it. There was simply nothing left on the table after the final curtain call.

The next day we called in to the Saatchi Gallery off Sloane Square in the vain hope that we might see something to spin our wheels. No such luck. This gallery is still art central disaster. As we strolled back along the Thames towards Pimlico we dived into the grandly named pub ‘The King William IV’. The pub itself was completely forgettable but the location was top draw. We just sat there on a crisp spring afternoon looking directly over the river in the general direction of that brilliant masterpiece of British architecture – The Battersea Power Station. There is no escaping this building; it totally dominates the Pimlico horizon. As an aside, this disused facility last operated in 1983, is currently on the block for the first time in its history with an asking price of UKP500 million. For your money you receive 39.1 acres of prime land, four chimneys and about a billion used bricks.

Sunday was a Biggie! Front and centre early afternoon at the Royal Albert Hall to take in the epic opera ‘Aida’. We didn’t quite know what to expect and as novice opera goers we had steeled ourselves to be slightly bored. Wrong! This performance was mind blowing. It was larger than life and packed with action. It’s got us hooked for future operas.

To celebrate such a great afternoon we took a diversion on the way home via ‘The Blue Bar’ at The Berkeley in Knightsbridge. What a place, what a bar, atmosphere, real class and prices to match. In fact the receipt for the four Merlots is still glowing 24 hours later as if it’s been dipped in uranium.

Today we had a low-key day and toured the Olympic village on an organized walk. It has to be said that the British are very proud of this East London development, and so they should be. Our guide made the point that when people bemoan the 3.5 million pound price tag, they are forgetting that this figure equates to only 1.5 percent of the UK government recent bail out of it’s banking sector. Indications are that this will be a top-notch Olympics and with buildings erected that will be used for generations to come.

That’s it. See ya.

Settling In

Hi folks,

Just thought I had better update you on what we have been up to since our feet hit English soil. This is an additional blog for today, as John has given you some light relief with his earlier quirky reflections.

Now - day one. This was a biggie! All went very easily through Heathrow and the tube into the city, in fact, a little too easy as we found out on our arrival at Dolphin Square.

Check in was a nightmare or a slapstick comedy depending on which side of the desk you sat. The bottom line is, that we were presented with a partially furnished flat, which means, basic bed, sofa, table etc. No TV, no microwave, no phone, no cutlery, crockery, toilet rolls…. you name it, it was singularly absent.

No matter, with high motivation levels and a wad full of UK pounds we set our sights on Argos for the hardware and Sainsbury’s for the good stuff like wine and food.

Like nesting birds for two days we flew off collecting all the stuff needed and we now we have transformed this seventh floor basic apartment into a really good place to hang out.

Friday night we decided at the last minute to celebrate all our hard work sorting the flat with a pub-crawl through our old stomping ground in Islington. It was a brilliant night and all the pubs and bars were going off in spectacular fashion. Nothing changes!

As is always the case over the weekend, Transport for London carried out tube track maintenance and in our case, as we only have the Victoria Line running through Pimlico we were forced to stroll to Victoria Station to lock into any other tube services.

So, on Saturday evening we took the opportunity to walk from Pimlico down to the National Theatre along the Lambeth Walk to take in a performance of ‘Travelling Light’. That walk was a bit of an eye-opener, as it appeared that there were just us, maybe a couple of dozen English passer-byes and a hundred thousand Eastern Europeans. The play itself was a hilarious Jewish spoof on the establishment of the movie industry. John and I whispered that we felt like we were at a pre-WWII theatre performance as there were only two non-white faces in the audience and the fashion sense was really retro. We were surrounded by Jewish patrons, who, at every punch line responded vigorously in the manner of Basil Brush’s ‘Boom-boom’ or Alan Parson’s (Steve Cogan) ‘A-Ha’. With my linguistic ears on, I left the playhouse with very strong Russian-Jewish accented phrases creeping into my speech.

Then Sunday was wet and cold, perfect for visiting our daughter Shana’s old work place The Constitution pub in Churton Street, Pimlico. It’s a cosy and convivial pub with the locals eating their Sunday roast and downing this with endless pints of the brown stuff while watching the footy. Of course, a significant number of the men were dressed in their team’s colours, which added to the vibrancy of the mood.

To keep things in balance, we had planned on doing something cultural, like visiting the Tate and catching a recital at St Paul’s later in the afternoon. However we flagged it away in favour of whiling away the afternoon down Oxford Street, a couple of drinks at ‘The Argyll Arms’ and then primed to the point where, when we reached Embankment tube station we felt that old magnetic draw take hold of us to drop into the caverns of ‘Gordon’s Wine Bar’. This place was heaving and was frenetic with activity. As is always the case, there was standing room only and after being squashed up against a gushing, loud-mouthed American lad pulverizing his girlfriends about how wonderful he was I was keen to find another leaning place to drink. This dialogue nearly gave me pub-rage so I leapt upon a recently vacated corner table with relish to escape the gerbil. The young girlfriend looked across at me in a desperate attempt of ‘don’t leave me alone with this East coast plonker’. I let her drown in his sea of verbal diarrhea and continued supping on my French plonk while taking in the new view down into caverns.

That’s it for now…will report back soon.

Guys, on any other day I might have left any further thoughts about that Singapore / London flight back at the terminal, however whilst consuming a few Froggie reds at Gordon’s Wine Bar last evening the subject came up regarding a couple of the passengers sitting near us on the flight, so we thought we would share our experience.

We were just getting comfortable in our seats when along comes this guy with wife and two young girls in tow.

This chap was a behemoth. He was so tall his head was scraping the cabin roof as he strolled down the aisle to his seat. Flash trainers, some kind of athletes training pants and jacket and a baseball cap (obviously on backwards).

The man then proceeds to take off his trainers and replace them with Jandals, unzip his pants and expose the longest pair of shorts I have ever seen, then take off his jacket to reveal a cut away tee shirt, the sort of garb that would secure first place in the Olympics Worst Dressed Athlete Awards. This tank top/tee shirt was a real piece of work. It was the sort of think you would have seen way back on Yugoslavian basketball players.

I simply stared at this guy and the first thing that came to mind was how is it possible that a human being can have such large big toes? We are talking here at maybe each big toe being two thirds the size of a computer mouse. These were seriously big hunks of flesh and not easily overlooked when exposed in the cabin light. The second thing was the size of this guys watch. I know a thing or two about watches and had always thought that the IWC brand had a stranglehold on oversized watches however this guy’s timepiece blew that theory into the weeds. This sucker must have been 8-10cm in diameter. I initially thought the man must be partially sighted and this miniature grandfather clock strapped to his wrist was some kind of Braille devise, however I was wrong on that score as no sooner had the flight taken off then this guy starts watching videos, having stuck on a monster sized chromed head set. These headphones were so large that they looked like the bug eyes of the flesh eating monster one encounters in most of those fifties
“ Aliens From Space” movies, and this is where this guy gets seriously weird. I was looking in his general direction when he locked onto a film called The Immortals. It was one of those Russell Crowe Gladiator numbers. Two hours of mindless mayhem. Then he became really interesting when, having watched the end of this little number, the guy started watching the entire movie again, and again, and on and on. In fact this chap watched the film end on end for the entire fourteen-hour flight. This was one seriously strange individual.

Oh yes, one more thing, for whatever reason this guy had a huge tattoo on his left bicep that listed his kids names and date of birth, viz, HALLE ROSE 18/11/2002 and LAYLA 19/03/2005.

Now if that guy was entertainment enough for one flight, seated directly in front of us was an English father and son. The father was maybe my age and the son in his late teens.

I didn’t actually notice these guys until shortly after take off when after the seat belt sign went off both these guys leapt into the aisle, opened the overhead locker, dragged out colour matching oversized travel bags and extracted matching day-glow sound cancelling headphones. I then took a closer look and realized that these guys were also wearing matching English football supporter outfits, right down to matching brilliant white trainers. I wouldn’t have thought any more on these dudes if it hadn’t been for the fact that as soon as they were reseated they lifted their adjoining armrest. Now lets face it, family love aside, this was a pretty strange move for a couple of guys. The next thing you know these chaps are whispering to each other with their faces so close that they were almost touching each other. I pointed this all out to Julia who immediately suggested they were probably lovers who had gone to Singapore for a grubby weekend. I responded that I didn’t think it was that simple as there features strongly suggested they were father and son and the only way that wouldn’t have been the case was if both these guys had been at the mercy of a very poor back street plastic surgeon. The father must have worked long and hard to get into his sons headspace as the poor turkey followed his dad’s every move, be it drinks, meal choice, movie or whatever.

At one point in the middle of the flight dad leapt out of his seat and frantically stretching and flexing in the area directly in front of our seats. Not to be outdone the son then also leapt into the action. It was like watching a live version of Richard Symons Air New Zealand pre-flight safety video. It was very creepy stuff, right down to the father continually touching his sons lower back region in encouragement.

I have to say that travelling economy, though a bit of a pain, is in fact a really interesting way to fly.

Cheers