Category: Britain

Vile Coffee and Nobody Famous

When Liam and I got hitched we asked for Thomas Cook vouchers as wedding gifts. We had already made the fateful (or was it fatal?) decision to migrate to Asia Minor and didn’t need a brown Kenwood toaster with a cornflower motif. Nor did we want his and his John Lewis bath robes. Since then we’ve slowly used up most of the vouchers for our Blighty flights but the process was becoming a bit of a drag. Vouchers can only be exchanged in Thomas Cook travel shops and these are as rare as ethnic minorities on Midsomer Murders. We decided on a final spree and used what we had left on business class tickets to London via Istanbul with Turkish Airlines.

We could hardly contain our anticipation when we arrived at the domestic terminal at Bodrum Airport. We breezed past the hoi polloi like minor celebs to the business class check-in and onwards to the business class lounge – vile coffee, limitless booze, dry croissants, nobody famous. The flight to Istanbul was pleasant enough with a welcome glass of bubbly and a hot breakfast from a fixed-smile waitress wearing too much tarty slap. Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport was a frenetic potpourri of the exotic and the mundane. The bazaar medley included a mysterious sect of elderly men in Persil-white towelling togas. We fled the bedlam to the utter indulgence and serenity of the business class lounge – vile coffee, limitless booze, dry croissants, nobody famous.

We boarded our Heathrow-bound plane expecting to turn left into unashamed comfy luxury and regal pampering. Our excited smiles crumbled as we were directed right towards our hard standard size seats. There was no more extra leg room than ordinary emergency exit seats and the food was only distinguishable from economy fare by the china crockery. The much vaunted entertainment selection consisted of an obscure disaster movie about a runaway train and an hour of adverts from the flickering mini screen that descended from the bottom of the overhead lockers. I’ve been better diverted on charter. Booze was provided only on request. Worse still, just a thin curtain divided us from the plebs back in coach. The experience left us disenchanted with a wasted wedding gift and lamenting our decision to reject the brown Kenwood toaster with cornflower motif. What an expensive flop.

Nine days later we returned to Heathrow with heavy hearts. We breezed past the hoi polloi like minor celebs to the business class check-in and onwards to the business class lounge – delicious coffee, limitless booze, butter-moist croissants, nobody famous. We boarded our Istanbul-bound plane expecting to turn right into our barely above economy cabin. Our resigned expressions were transformed into crazy grins as we were directed left into unashamed comfy luxury and regal pampering. We sank into our soft capacious seats with sixteen button-operated positions and in-chair massage. The individual screens provided entertainment of boundless possibilities. Spoilt for choice, Liam couldn’t decide so flattened his seat and took a cat-nap instead. The three course supper was haute cuisine and our camp thin-wristed attendant silently filled my glass without prompting as he swished down the aisle. Just the ticket.

Back in Istanbul, we headed to the business class lounge – vile coffee, no croissants, no booze, nobody famous. We boarded a dedicated business class mini-bus to our return flight to Bodrum – glass of bubbly, cold supper, proper crockery. All our flights provided stainless steel mini cutlery. I assume terrorists can’t afford business class.

Hi De Hi

Hi De Hi!

The final instalment of our trip to Blighty was a cheap and cheerful family gathering at Butlin’s in Bognor Regis for my Mother’s 80th birthday celebrations. On the morning of the great day we organised a modest birthday bash. The family assembled at the designated time and my eldest brother gave a speech as befits the head boy. This was followed by the British première of ‘The Only Virgin in London’ a photo and video montage of Mother’s life set to music. There was hardly a photo of the Bognor Belle without a fag in hand. Mother has puffed away on twenty a day since the Suez Crisis with few detrimental side effects. It’s a shame she can’t get her fix on prescription as the cost is crippling on a state pension. Liam had worked on the DVD for months creating a superb piece of slushy, sentimental art worthy of the grand occasion. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

Looks Just Like the Kaiser

I was pleasantly surprised by Butlin’s. Not at all the ‘Hi De Hi’ potting sheds and am dram vision of Hell I was expecting. There’s even a five star hotel attached. Apparently, Bognor is the oldest recorded Saxon place name in England and the sunshine capital of Britain, though the latter accolade is hardly worth bragging about. The town was bestowed the Regis suffix after George V convalesced there in 1929. Subsequently, on his deathbed royal aides attempted to console the grumpy and dim huntin’, shootin’, fishin’ King-Emperor by suggesting he would soon be well enough to visit Bognor again. His final words are widely, but incorrectly, reported as being “Buggar Bognor!” I have some sympathy with the sentiment.

The Matriarch

We spent a joyous evening with my kid sister, her partner and their four football obsessed boisterous boys. She is the only one of my siblings never to have married. Her partnership has endured longer than any other in my family where divorce has been the depressing norm. Their humble home is south London is warmed by love and respect and my sister rules the roost with gentle discipline and a dogged determination that her boys will be decent people. She is a chip off our mother’s block and she is succeeding.

Hell and Damnation

I was sad yesterday when I heard that Elizabeth Taylor had died at the age of 79. Dame Liz retained her British nationality despite becoming the definitive all-American Hollywood star. Sensible girl. She wouldn’t have got the damehood without it.

I suppose she’ll be remembered more for the high drama of her personal life than her art. I will remember her for helping to raise over $100 million for the AIDS charity that she founded at a time when many thought that people with AIDS should be left to rot in the gutter.

I was mad today when I read that the congregation from Westboro Baptist Church intend to picket Dame Liz’s funeral. Margie Phelps, daughter of the hate group’s leader, Fred Phelps, tweeted “RIP Elizabeth Taylor is in hell as sure as you’re reading this and getting mad as a wet hen. She should’ve obeyed God. Too late!”  It’s nice to know the hell and damnation school of enlightened thought is alive and well.

The Pink Pound

We caught up on all the dire economic news in the UK though the credit crunch seemed to be completely passing Soho by as I tottered through. I have long been used to being fleeced by brewers and inn-keepers who target the pink economy. The tradition has continued with the £4 pint of cooking lager. Despite the extortion, I spotted lots of conspicuous consumption and people doing what they have always done – shop, sup and cruise. The queens fiddle while Rome burns.

It’ll Make You Go Blind

Clive and I know one another from our salad days. In those distant times we were two of the three fey musketeers. Our third partner in camp crime was Paul who jumped the good ship Blighty many decades ago to dwell in a Parisian garret and chain-smoke Gitanes. Birds of a feather flock together. We somehow knew we were different and so did everyone else. We were relentlessly teased from the moment we entered the school gates. Nothing physical, you understand. That would be unseemly at a traditional grammar school with 400 years of history. Besides, beatings were reserved for the teachers to discharge. I suppose we hardly helped our cause by being rubbish at rugby and lip-synching to the backing vocals of Mott the Hoople’s Roll Away the Stone in Clive’s front room. Our sex education consisted of lecturing hormonal adolescents on the evils of masturbation. It nearly caused a riot.

Ian is a more recent acquaintance, a mere 15 years so a young friendship. As saucy singletons he and I trawled the dances halls of Europe and had a ball. Nowadays we are both hitched and respectable members of the elder gay community. Ian exists at the epicentre of gay culture by managing a licenced sex shop in Soho. He won’t tell his mother he’s gay. She knows of course. Mothers always do. But then, being nearly 50 with teeth and hair intact and never marrying is a bit of a clue.

Cuba Libre

It is the occasion of Maurice’s half century. He is adamant that he doesn’t want a fuss so he’s off on a Caribbean getaway to Cuba to celebrate the day on a beach with a cuba libre and a fat cigar. He clearly underestimated the determination of partner Alun, the fiery Welsh dragon. A surprise party was planned and executed a few days before. We joined the jamboree along with a parade of bears, cubs and chubby chasers who had forsaken their XXL fix to congratulate the birthday boy. XXL is a huge London club for fat boys and their admirers providing an excellent alternative service to those of us with our best years behind us and who can’t compete in the otherwise body obsessed, steroid-buffed twinky scene.

Maurice is not one to take centre stage, preferring to let others fly. He endured the attention with his usual polite charm grinning through gritted teeth and dreaming of the beach and the bacardi.

A Game of Two Halves

The walls of Karen’s gaff are dripping with original art. One or two of the canvasses are worth more than my pension pot. As I have reached my clumsy age I fret endlessly about knocking over the Clarice Cliff especially when returning slightly worse for wear after a night on the tiles. I’ve been trying to drop subtle hints about making sure the will’s up to date and to remember her poor gay relations.

Karen is the Honorary President of the Wycombe Wanderers Trust in recognition of her grandfather, Frank Adams, former player and club benefactor. She carries out her responsibilities with dedication and enthusiasm even on the coldest match days. She’s promised me a stadium tour. I’ve accepted on the understanding that I can be the soap on a rope in the changing rooms.

Evenin’ All

Once more we are staying at Karen’s gaff in Southfields. She, on the other hand, has decided to decamp to the States for the duration leaving us in the safe hands of her lodging nephew Jack, my namesake. Jack junior is a special constable and looks devastatingly cute in his uniform. He let  me feel his truncheon though I resisted the urge to handle his helmet. Thumbing his warrant card reminded me of the time, many years ago, when I met an arresting sergeant from the Los Angeles Police Department. He showed me his LAPD badge which was so heavy I asked him if he hit people across the head with it. Before entering the Police Service, Jack had been a part time model for Abercrombie and Fitch. Expect to see him as the new pretty face of  Crimewatch sometime soon. He can feel my collar anytime

The Hills Have Eyes

Clement has fled to the hills to his village bungalow. I must confess to a slight sense of ambiguity by his exodus. In many ways he’s been a gracious and kindly neighbour but his quaintly old-fashioned views are way out of kilter with the modern world, a bit like an eccentric maiden aunt. I shall not to miss his angry evening discourses – how dear old England has lost its moral compass and is going to Hell in a handcart. He is emotionally and spiritually drawn to the warmth of traditional Turkish family values. It reminds him of the Blighty of his youth where everyone knew their place and were happy with their lot. Those were the halcyon days of consumption, grinding poverty and backstreet abortions where the love that dares not speak its name would result in persecution and a stiff prison sentence. I wish him the best but fear for the worst.