London 5

Dear Friends

I am back after a long hiatus. I am sorry that it took so long to write another blog. You see, I have been trying to immerse myself this city and make the best of my time here, instead of being miserable all the time. Well, as it turns out, London has unexpectedly settled on me like and unwelcome fungus.

The Cold War continues
The Cold War at Russia House continues. My dealings with my housemates remain minimal, with the odd encounter in the kitchen and Olga’s grumpy greeting that sounds like “Nyello”― rather guttural and nasal at the same time. My situation at Russia House for the moment, however, is comfortable and convenient and I do not see myself moving from there for a while. The rent is cheap enough and allows me to save good money.

(A beautiful shot of Canary Wharf at night)

The weather in London has gotten better with Friday seeing the highest temperature since I have been here, 18 degrees that is. After work on Friday, the city was something amazing. Pubs around the city were packed with after work drinkers and their sidewalks crowded with those trying to catch the last sunrays the day and Canary Wharf saw crowds akin to Camps Bay on a Sunday afternoon. This heat wave was short-lived though. I woke up to a winter wonderland this morning with snowfall that has settled in the early morning hours, and continued falling till about three hours ago. The snow on the trees and the ground has since melted away and now just the forever uninteresting cold remains.

Back in my beloved Cape Town
I still miss Cape Town very much. In fact, from time to time I toy with the idea of packing up and moving back to Cape Town. My recent trip back did me the world of good though. I have newfound perspective on my reasons for being here again. I realized that I left Cape Town with certain goals in mind and they are still a while from completion. It was also wonderful to see the few friends that I did manage to see. I cannot begin to explain how much it meant to me to see everyone, and again I realized what wonderful friends I have back home and that makes me happy, yet also sad because the new friends that I do make here have a lot to live up to, and I have been known to be very fussy.

Arriving in Cape Town at first was like walking back into my own city and feeling like a stranger. Even though I had only been away for six months, things understandably felt different. Although I was staying with my best friend in the world, it was strange not to go to my own place from the airport. Things also seemed a lot more expensive than when I left, which was weird because it had after all only been six months. I was shocked to pay almost R30 for a packet of cigarettes at the airport.

(Mimi strutting her stuff)

Richard’s 40th birthday party also made me feel somewhat out of place. Although there were loads of old faces, there were also newcomers to A Touch of Madness and that made me feel somewhat left behind and forgotten. I guess I expected things to be exactly the same as when I left. The usual after party at Richard’s felt like old times again though and when I left there I realized that was the last time for a very long that I would have that experience again, and my emotions got the better of me.

The trip also mad me realize how loved I am. Not only by my closest friends but by also friends whom I met only months before I left. I really learned a lesson in the value of friendship from that trip, which was something I guess I have always known, but it is one of those things that you don’t ponder everyday.

(Me and Callie having a laugh)


New friends bring new energy
I arrived back in London feeling very somber and tired from days of little sleep. It was hard to go back to work and even harder to make an effort to like this city. I slipped back into a mild depression over the Easter weekend, and my saving grace came in the form of a new friend from work, Gail inviting me to dinner at her house. Gail is really funny. Although of Scottish heritage originally; she has lived in England for many years. She is somewhat posh; although she professes to be from a middle class family (the class system in England is going to have to be a subject of one of my blogs one of these days). I sit in meetings with Gail some times and she gets this look of indignation on her face that’s akin to that of any upper class Maggie Smith character in any British period piece. She would make these very dry, sarcastic comments that make me want to wet myself in the middle of meetings. Her wit is the quintessential British wit that I got to know from British television exports. Gail’s husband, Ashley, is from real upper class stock. His father served as ambassador to a few countries and Ash went to the same schools as either Prince William or Prince Harry, I forget which one. Gail and Ash are hysterically funny and are probably the best friends I have made since my arrival here. They have been very good to me. I have gone to their place in Surrey for dinner a few times and have stayed over there each time. They have made vow that I would phone them every time I felt down and missed my friends back home. In them I see friends I will know forever.

The arrival of a fellow Touch of Madness local
I was ecstatic to find out in Cape Town that my dear friend Steve James got his visa and was due to leave for London a day before my return. I met Steve, in his green to London form at a lovely little bar in Notting Hill that could have been A Touch of Madness except it was much smaller and there was no Richard. It was wonderful to sit and talk to someone who knew some of my closest friends, and was also a little out of place. Steve however beamed with the enthusiasm of a newcomer that I remember and I couldn’t help but think, how long will it last? Then again, Steve is a much more positive person than me. I tend to be too sentimental and it takes a lot out of me to see the upside of an uncomfortable situation. I think he is far more capable of making lemonade out of the lemons he gets handed. I suspect he will find it far easier to fit into this city though. It was wonderful laughing for hours about the misdemeanors we have gotten up to at A Touch of Madness. I felt a tinge of camaraderie, a friend with whom I can tackle this city that is proving such a challenge to me. It was good to be sitting and laughing with someone who understood what I was about. I do hope I get to see lots of him in this city where it is so easy to see your friends only once every two or three months.

(Its Fendi Darling!)

The bikers, the handbags and cute officer
As it goes with everything new, you always draw comparisons with the old. It hasn’t been different with London. In fact, I have especially scrutinized London because this London hasn’t quite yet lived up to the London of my dreams. One of these comparisons has been crime in London which is an interesting concept. Although I leave my bedroom window open everyday when I go to work because of damp issues, no one (touch wood) has broken in yet. Yet the news reports on crime suggest that London is actually quite a crime infested city. Every other day you read about yet another young boy who was stabbed to death in East London, or another girl that has gone missing, and with elections for the new Lord Mayor around the corner, Londoners are particularly focused on crime at the moment. A few nights ago, after a lovely dinner in fabulous Knightsbridge at a lovely Italian restaurant opposite Harrods, I found myself in a little bar in posh Sloane Street where the likes of Harvey Nichols, Gucci and Louis Vuitton reside. As I sat there reading my book, I suddenly heard a very loud crash followed by an alarm sounding. At first I thought someone had driven into a stationary car, but as staff and other barflies rushed to the door, I followed suit. And there, at the Fendi shop across the road was a big hole where the glass door used to be. We were still standing there wondering what had happened, when three motorbikes drove out of the shop and the drivers and their passengers were all loaded with as many bags as they could possibly carry. With a Fendi bag costing easily into the thousands of pounds I am sure they drove of with bags valued in the tens of thousand of pounds. I was questioned later by a very cute police officer who told me that this is a new burglary trend targeting high end stores in the city. We got talking about South Africa and Cape Town and I got the feeling that he was interested in me, because he promised to come back for a drink after his shift which was due to end shortly. I unfortunately had to leave before his shift was over. I guess I’ll just keep wondering about him, and wait for the next time I witness a drive-in burglary. All of this aside, however, I had to marvel at the ingenuity behind this burglary scheme. It seems quite simple really, if you consider how quick you can get in, grab what you want and drive off before the standard police response time. I am surprised this hasn’t been invented back home yet. I thought our criminals were some of the most sophisticated in the world. Although I wouldn’t count on them knowing a Fendi from a Pep stores bag! The clever London robbers didn’t count on a nearby paparazzi photographer catching them on film though!

Well, I leave you with this little banter for now dear friends. Till next, and I promise to try and make the intervals shorter!

Love Gerald

(Said cute cop ouside the Fendi store)

London 4

Dear Friends

I have been living in London now for almost 3 months, which seems totally unreal. I have been working for two of those three months and right now I am sitting writing on a train from Washington to New York. That’s right, I spent my Christmas in New York, and then came to Washington to visit my friend Paco who actually lives in New York, but is in Washington visiting his mom. I will talk about the trip a little later in this entry; first I wanted to tell you a little about my work in London.

(The picture is lunch with the team just before Christmas)

He works hard for his money

As I have mentioned before, I accepted a job as Head of Conference Sponsorship for an international media house, much like Spintelligent, whom I worked for in Cape Town, except this is a much bigger company, employing some 300 staff in four offices around the world. The job is really very similar to the one that I did in Cape Town, with the exception that I am now managing a team selling sponsorship packages on

pharmaceutical conferences mostly in Europe. The people in this company are quite varied. There are a lot of expats from around the world, so this makes for a melting pot of varying personalities and tempers. There have been a few mini explosions caused by disagreements. It has been quite funny to be on the outside looking in on these and not being privy to the politics surrounding them.

My team consists of four English guys, who have been really amazing at welcoming me to the company. I expected animosity as would be normal with a new manager arriving. They have however been really supportive and have really come to the party with every task at hand. I am however told by a sceptic friend that new brooms sweep clean, and likewise do new teams. I really hope that’s not the case.

My immediate boss is on the whole a really nice guy. Guy, my boss, is from the East End of London and is a character of note. He has me in tears with laughter at least three times a day, which is weird because I am normally the one to make people laugh! I must say, I do feel only slightly jealous. He does have the tendency to be a bit like a school teacher sometimes, which drives me fucking mad. The only worrying thing is that his politics lean a little to the right― he belongs to an organization called “Republicans Abroad”. I first thought this was a joke, but this turned out to be for real, he is a card carrying member and goes to meetings. I really don’t know yet how to react to this.

It has taken me a while to adjust to the new job and its demands on my time. I get up at 6am to be at the office by 8. If I was living with one other person only, I would have had the luxury of getting up at 7am, but bathroom politics at Russia House involves a regimental timetable drawn up by Olga and allows me exactly 30 minutes in the bathroom starting at 6am. I generally don’t leave the office before 7pm, which means that I get home at 8pm and have to be in bed again by 10pm, so you can do the maths. So far this issue as well as the stress have been the only two things that I have resented about my job. I don’t remember being this stressed at Spintelligent. Stressed I have been, but not nearly as much as now, I don’t think. A friend reckons that I have been far more stressed when I first started at Spintelligent. In honesty, the stress and the amount of time I spend at work and on the tube are causing me to resent London a little. I did not envisage my life being like this. I just hope that as the time goes by, things will get a little easier and that I will finally begin to enjoy the London that I fell in love with the times that I visited.

A quiet birthday
My birthday came on December 15 and I invited a few friends old and new to drinks in Soho. The affair was sedate; much unlike my usual large birthday bashes in Cape Town. Although it was really nice and everyone who was there made a real effort, it was just not like being in Cape Town. I missed having a big party with limos or 1930’s themes or loads of presents of course! I spent most of the time worried that people were comfortable, because we couldn’t get a booking so 10 or so people were hanging around the bar waiting for any available seat. I ended up getting really drunk and dancing at a seedy gay club till the early hours of the morning.

(In the picture are Rory, me and Adi at my birthday drinks)

Our company Christmas party happened on Wednesday December 19, and this also went by completely uneventfully. Unlike the Spintelligent Christmas parties that involved two day cruises, or fabulously extravagant themed parties, this had a bowling theme and took place in a bowling alley. Whilst bowling was really nice, that was it. There were a few other games, but I have never really liked games of any kind. I know I sound like a real cry-baby right now, but I am suddenly sitting back and seeing how different my life is and I don’t really like it. That is to be really honest. I know I will take time to settle and that in a year’s time I will probably be laughing about how silly I have been. Well I am naturally impatient, I am all for instant gratification. For now I find peace in the fact that “this too shall pass”. As my friend Margo always says, “Adventures are never comfortable when you’re in them”.

(Times Square)

New York again
It transpired on payday, December 21 that I had some money spare after saving some and paying my bills, and I had previously seen some really cheap fares advertised for return flights to New York. I also had to fly a total of 3000 miles in order to maintain the gold status on my frequent flyer program. So I did the most impulsive thing I have ever done and booked a ticket to New York to depart three days later. I would spend Christmas in New York and take the train to Washington, DC later in the week to visit Paco and return to New York for another day or two in order to fly back to London on December 30.

(Gotham City)

I am now approaching the end of that visit. I arrived in New York on Monday and spent four glorious days there mostly on my own. I am staying at Paco’s place which is pretty central in Williamsburg, just outside Manhattan. This has allowed me to move in and out of the city with ease. I took an open top bus tour of Manhattan on Christmas day, which turned out to be one of the most enjoyable things I have ever done. I have been to New York so many times yet I have never taken a real tour. The next few days were spent shopping and museum hopping. I saw a wonderful exhibition at the MoMA (Museum of Modern Art), went to the Top of the Rocks, the observation deck on the 70th floor of the Rockefeller Centre. The views from the top were absolutely exquisite, and reminded me again of how much I love New York.

(Central Park in the background)

I have made two wonderful friends in New York, thanks to Paco. I met Dawn earlier this year when I was en-route back from a conference I did in Texas. I had taken a few days to relax in New York before embarking on a business trip elsewhere in the USA. Our first meeting was arriving at Dawns house in Queens where she had whipped up a cocktail concoction with grapefruit vodka and cranberry juice which we aptly christened “Ruby Dawn”. We were supposed to meet my friend Elize, who was also in New York at the time at a Greek place in Queens called “Opa! Opa!” and because of the amount we had to drink, we forgot about Elize, a first-timer in New York, at the restaurant.We arrived over an hour late, but had a wonderful time nonetheless.

(Me and Dawn)

My meeting with Dawn this time was just as alcoholic. We had dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant in Manhattan which was wonderful. The food was simply orgasmic, but it was the conversation between Dawn and I that turned all attentions to our table. The restaurant was full of Asians, and the ones in hearing distance were all either totally horrified or snickered in very polite Asian way at the very sexually loaded but funny conversation Dawn and I were engaged in. No wonder the waiter were really rude to us. I am sure that we must have upset their very delicate Asian disposition. Dawn and I went in search for a seedy bar to try and pick up unsuspecting straight men, but no luck. We found the seedy bar, but no luck at finding unsuspecting straight men!

When I told Paco at the last minute that I was traveling to New York he was very kind to put me in touch with his friend Angela, the other lovely new friend I had made in New York. Angela was so lovely she arranged for me to meet her and Melora, Paco’s neighbor and friend for lunch to pick up Paco’s keys. Later that week we went for drinks at this trendy bar in Brooklyn and spoke about Cape Town all night, as Angela and Melora had been to Cape Town about two years ago. We were supposed to meet for breakfast the next morning, but I woke up with a terrible flu and she was sweet enough to bring me medication

and breakfast!
(Angela on the left with her friend Pollyanna,
who was visiting from Manchester)

My trip to Washington, DC was to see my friend Paco at least while I was there. This trip has been the first that was not attached to business. Every time I have been to New York it has been either en-route to or on the way back from a business trip around the US, so I wasn’t always 100% relaxed, and Paco was always the perfect host. Paco’s mother lives just outside DC, and he was visiting her for Christmas, hence my decision to visit him there. I had a wonderful time. Spent the two days wondering all the Smithsonian museums and eating wonderful lunches and then even more wonderful dinners prepared by Paco, who is the original foodie.

(My dear friend Paco)

This trip to New York made me realize again how much I loved that city. And I have to admit that there is a part of me that regrets a little bit not taking the job in New York. I can sit here forever writing about what I love about New York and hate about London and I will be busy for a very long time. Who knows, I might actually end up in New York still some day. For now I have to love where I am despite the challenges, and make peace with the fact I will be dancing next to the beat for a while.

For now, dear friends, I bid you adieu. Thanks for reading and thanks for loving.

Love Gerald

(One of my favorite pieces of architecture, the Chrysler Tower)