A quest for the locations in the novels of Haruki Murakami and other travel musings
Author: mikeraggett
I'm a writer, producer and director living in London. My interests are wide ranging: reading, theatre, art and music battle it out with food and wine (especially Spanish), gardening, walking, Hampshire cricket, Watford Football Club and Boston Red Sox for prime spot which of course changes all the time.
Some weeks ago in Regent Street we experienced some amazing customer service. I saw a jacket (but not with those trousers) that I liked and Dee kindly offered by buy it for me as a birthday present. Of course they didn’t have my size but since this was J Crew and we knew we were going to America soon we asked if they had any stock in my size in or around Boston. The guy serving us, who just happened to hail from Boston, checked the computer and found there was one at the store in Chestnut Hill Mall which we happened to be familiar with from our time of living in Brookline just a little way back in along Rte 9. He then amazed us by calling and speaking to a colleague, allowing Dee to pay for it by credit card – less than it would have been in London – and agreeing to hold it for us.
So after our day in the Met Bar we set off to Copley T station, bought go anywhere Charlie cards for $19 each and proceeded to board an outbound train. I had done a route search which told us to get off after two stops at Kenmore Square and take a bus, but we saw Chestnut Hill on the route map in the T so decided to stay on the train. Do as you are told! It was a fun ride through the suburbs but Chestnut Hill Station is rather a long way from the eponymous mall – like a mile and it’s midday and nearing 90 degrees. Mad dogs and Englishmen sound familiar? Well we made it, the coat was miraculously there waiting and it fits. They had a 50% sale on so I got a rather fetching shirt to go with it. We had a wander round the mall and then as previously advised by the Mass Bay Transit Authority took the number 60 which starts outside Bloomingdales and delivers us back to Kenmore Square from where we head back to Copley and drop stuff off.
We had spoken to our good friend Daisy about meeting up and so she came around and then we went to a exhibition of quilts together at the Museum of Fine Arts. It was a real eye-opener. The majority of them were made by Amish or Mennonite communities which one associates with plain colours and fabrics. These quilts almost literally jumped off the walls as us since many of them featured complementary colours from the spectrum which cause that optical dissonance which makes them appear to vibrate and shimmer. We wondered how such plain living folk had come by such colourful and patterned fabrics and still don’t have the answer. Some we liked, some we didn’t but it was a fascinating exhibition.
Dee and I had also spotted signs for modern Japanese prints, ceramics and bamboo sculpture so we set off through the impressive halls of the MFA (need to spend more time here as in so many galleries back home) where some very interesting prints showed young artists rediscovering the techniques of the ukiyo-e woodblock printers whose work has been admired and described in several previous blogs. The applications of the techniques were extremely varied ranging from almost animated line drawing to impressionist water colours. I was staggered in the next exhibit to see what artists can do with bamboo. As well as modern takes on various kinds of container there were completely abstract expressions of great skill and beauty. We also discovered that the MFA has 50,000 antique woodblock prints which it can’t possibly display but is in the process of digitizing so they can be viewed online. By the time we’d finished our visit – the museum is open late on Wednesdays and free after 4 pm although you still have to queue to pick up your non-ticket – it was around 9 so Daisy headed back home to Somerville and we headed back to the Met Bar for a light snack before heading somewhat wearily to 271 Dartmouth. There was confirmation on the TV that Independence Day was going to be a day early in Boston this year to avoid the ravages of hurricane Arthur. Good weather forecasting guys!
So we set off on the first of July with a 5.30 am arrival of one of south London’s ubiquitous Data Cars booked through their app which is highly efficient. We positively glide through early morning London and thoughts of an extra half hour in bed surge into the head but never mind it’s good to be in good time isn’t it? Terminal 3 seems to have fewer people than Southend with its stags and hens a couple of weeks ago and we breeze through bag drop and security and discover a new delight.For many years Dee has had a bank account that offers airport lounge access as a perk – one we’ve never taken advantage of, partly through our just-in-time scrambled arrival at airports, partly through it being buried away in the small print and needing to be activated. With a couple of hours to spare on this occasion we check it out spurred on by one of Dee’s colleagues who swears by them.
Oh what a difference from grabbing a sandwich in Pret or even a glass in the champagne bar! We check in expecting to have to pay for me as a guest but no one asks for any cash. A brilliant buffet breakfast is available for free and a full English can be purchased. The Number 1 Lounge is part of a chain and well worth signing up to. After breakfasting (or should that really be “after breaking fast”?) we repaired to the lounge area to read complimentary newspapers and magazines. We could have played pool or table football, watched a movie in a ten seater cinema or chosen a spa treatment
What a restful, restorative way to start a journey after what is always, whatever one’s best intentions, a bit of a KBS to get to the damn airport.The screens tell us to proceed to the gate so we leave our cocoon and re-enter the now rather busier terminal. Although billed at a Virgin Atlantic flight it is operated by Delta. Seats were comfortable, flight was very empty and it was utterly unmemorable which I guess is what you need in a flight. The one remarkable aspect was that the attendants seem to have been recruited for their ability to resemble Kathy Bates in Misery or Lotte Lenya as Rosa Klebb. You thought twice before asking these guys for anything.
Welcome to America! Terminal E at Logan airport is a familiar location – we even filmed there in 1994 – and while a few things have changed like the new electronic visa waiver ESTA programme which everyone without another form of visa has to complete before flying, some things it seems never will. Of the thirty booths where you can have you fingerprints checked and your photo taken only five were in operation so as usual the early arrival time of the flight (30 minutes in this case) are soon eaten up in the immigration hall. We stood in line for 75 minutes before being welcomed to the USA and being allowed to go and collect our lonely baggage. Lonely? Well you see US citizens go through seamlessly and had all long since lit out of the baggage claim area.
We were first in Boston at the time of the Big Dig which caused massive disruptions but now complete does enable you to get in from the airport with commendable speed. The driver dropped us off at the apartment we’d rented in Dartmouth Street, we negotiated the somewhat cryptic instructions for gaining entry only to be told that we could drop our bags but the cleaners were running late and could we go away for an hour or so. Bags and jackets deposited we emerge into a 33 degree Boston boiler, decide to turn right toward Newbury Street and find the Met Bar where in a very pleasant downstairs bar big screens were showing Argentina squeeze past Switzerland. So we settled in with a beer, checked our phones and found an email from our friend Jack Foley – desperate to find out where we were. His wife Robin had to go to New York next day for a few days and this would be our only chance to see her. So Jack told us to stay put and he and Robin would join us to watch the USA game due up next. Well we watched that and then repaired to a table on the street to take dinner and commiserate on the USA team exit. As you can see close friendships were restored after a nine year absence and Dee obviously said something that Robin found hilarious. You can also see that we stayed there until it got dark. So having been told at 1:30 to head out for an hour or so we finally made it back about ten hours later.
And so – after showing Jack and Robin our home for the next week and having a last one for the road – to a very comfortable bed in the Back Bay.
I started writing this on 9 April the anniversary of our departure on the trip to Japan last year which has been described in this blog.
However life, work and extraneous factors intervened. It's now July 3 and we're in Boston, MA about which more a little later.
9 April 2013 was indeed the day we flew from Heathrow for our eventful, amazing and never-to-be-forgotten trip to Japan. How we wish we were going again but the exigencies of budget and work will keep us here this year. My long absence from the blog has been due to a number of circumstances including limited social life and lots of writing for others rather than me or you.
However with spring in the air at last after the direst start to any year – ultra low return from our solar panels prove how grey it has been – it feels like time to take up my pen again. And then I got another urgent job for which I had to complete the first part of this week. The year has been so strange we’ve hardly been to any Watford matches relying instead on our friend Fran’s excellent blogs to keep us up to date with our team’s progress. No playoff excitement this year but some promising developments.
We did manage to go to our away game in Bournemouth back in January when we were excited by the prospect of the Japanese exhibits in the Russell Cotes Art Gallery and Museum. It’s a lovely eclectic collection assembled by one of the last great entrepreneur-travellers who gathered object that took his and his wife’s fancy from wherever the went – mostly in the Far East. The Japanese room had hundreds of objects but contained behind a perspex corridor along which you could inch your way and peer form side to side. Not ideal but with some glimpses of very interesting artefacts and scrolls.
Our taste for things Japanese was also fuelled by the mention of a Japanese garden on Margaret Island in Budapest where we went for a three night break on a very good deal from Groupon. The garden itself was a disappointment but not so Budapest although we did find cherry blossom. After an unpromising start with the first sign we saw emerging from the airport being a Tesco hypermarket,
Entrance to the Museum of Applied Arts
Budapest proved to be a delightful place to spend a few days. We made a concert with the Hilliard ensemble still in good voice all those years after their chart appearance with Jan Garbarek’s saxophone accompaniment in the incredible Vigado Concert Hall which re-opened two days before we arrived. It’s all gilt and marble and pillars and a total contrast to the Erkel theatre where we caught an excellent ballet programme the next night. Built as the People’s Opera during the communist era its clean lines and lack of adornment made it a very pleasant place to watch great performances of three Jiri Kylian works.
The highspot was a visit to the Szechenyi Baths a massive complex of thermal baths where we sat in a grand open air pool with water temperatures of 35 degrees and the air at 24 – fabulous.
Dee about to enter Szechenyi BathsBy the Chain Bridge
Architectural and culinary treasures abound and it’s definitely on the list for a return visit. Any of you who watch Drama on ITV sponsored by Viking River Cruises have seen the spotlit Chain Bridge, Buda Castle and Parliament Building modelled on the HP in London but with even more filigree.
We’ve been to more discussions and book launches at the Japan Foundation, entered a competition to win flights to Japan at the Japan Centre and discovered the joys – shared by grandchildren – of curry flavoured rice crackers.
Dee in the Garsington Garden
I’d heard of an opera in a country house in Oxfordshire some years ago but when a friend of ours Susanna told us she was its musical director we just had to go. Garsington Opera is very much Glyndebourne for the northern home counties but more bohemian in approach and audience. It’s now based on the Getty family’s Wormsley Estate just off the M40 past High Wycombe. The estate is also home to a fabulous cricket oval on which England women beat Australia last year in the first match of the Ashes. The extensive grounds are lined with picnic spots and restaurant marquees bringing a medieval feel to the whole thing. We were blessed with a fine day although it did get a bit breezy so we were glad we’d opted for in-marquee dining at the interval.The opera takes place in a glass pavilion which makes for a unique viewing experience in that performances start in broad daylight and then it gradually gets darker as the evening progresses. We saw Fidelio and in a great piece of theatre the released prisoners in Act 1 actually walk straight out of the auditorium and lounge about in the garden outside. Susanna was able to join us for dinner after warming up the chorus at the start of the interval so we had a great opportunity to catch up with her.
Mike by the cricket groundThe Opera PavilionField of feasting tents
I’ve been doing quite a bit of work for a Dutch publishing agency so took a day trip to Utrecht to meet them and an end-client. I flew from Southend airport which I scarcely knew existed but which was obviously very popular with a certain set. My thinking that there would be nobody there and I’d whizz through security after the hour’s drive from home was abruptly punctured by the sight of a bride and a retinue of bridesmaids; eight men in tiger onesies and a gaggle of guys with cork-trimmed hats. Then a look at the departure board for the three morning flights – Amsterdam, Krakow and Mallorca – and I knew I was in the stag and hen departure capital of Essex.
The flight was quick and the train connection from Schipol to Utrecht couldn’t have been easier. Clean, smooth and on time, I thought I was back in Japan. I had a few moments to stroll with my agency contact through the streets of Utrecht which is a cobbled, canal-threaded city with a vibrant street life. Tekst 2000 enjoy canalside offices in a vaulted cellar with a long hot desk for their colleagues and people like me. We went off to visit the client in Culemborg via a chain ferry so it was a day of just about every mode of transport.
20 years ago I was derided by newly made US friends for flying back to the UK on July 4 after my preliminary recce visit for what was to become Direct English. “Don’t you know we have the best fireworks show in the world on July 4?” Oops. So deciding to celebrate the Fourth of July properly this year we arrived in Boston as planned only to find that the firework display has been moved to July 3 to avoid being washed out by Hurricane Arthur. So history is rewritten and the War of Independence ended a day early – at least this year in Boston.
It’s been a while since the last blog – far too much work and play (yippee!) – but a lot has been going on – much of it with a Japanese flavour.
Everybody has seen Hokusai’s The Great Wave off Kanagawa even if they didn’t know that was what they were seeing. It’s from a series of wood block prints called 36 views of Mount Fuji. We have reproductions of two of them on the walls at home so the opportunity to see all of them in digitally analysed new versions was too good to miss. The exhibition was at the Old Truman Brewery on Brick Lane and to get there we went through the Spitalfields Market a lively area with craft, fashion and food stalls which we’d missed out on since it’s rebirth a few years ago. Great fun on a Saturday morning – very lively.
Some people are critical of ‘new’ versions of old works of art but seeing the whole series together was fascinating. Each print depicts aspects of everyday life in the Edo period (1603 to 1868)) always with a hint of Fujisan in the composition in the most imaginative ways. It showed just what a superb artist he was. The exhibition also confirmed the outstanding skills of the wood block makers and printers who worked with the artists of the period.
Prints on paper however well displayed always fade with age so seeing the colours as vibrant as they would have been in the first editions I found startling and a further tribute to the woodblock makers who had to make a block for each colour in the print. The exhibition also had various artists’ re-imaginings of Hokusai in an exhibition space laid out like the streets of old Edo with red lanterns and small rooms devoted to different visual approaches. A vast video wall completed the exhibition with images some of which gelled and some of which I failed to connect with. But a fascinating occasion all round.
Later in the month we saw lots more Hokusai in the brilliant Shunga exhibition at the British Museum – surely one of very few that have to carry a PG certificate! All the great artists of the period seem to have engaged in making erotic prints alongside their mainstream work. The extensive array gathered here shows that their drawings and the prints that followed were of the same quality as their mainstream work. It also confirms that sex can be elegant, energetic, exaggerated, delicate, delightful and dangerous but above all should be fun. There’s a great quote displayed relating to the old adage that size doesn’t matter:
“if ‘the thing’ were depicted in its actual size there would be nothing
of interest, for that reason don’t we say that art is fantasy?”
A couple of the more publishable shunga images for a family audience
The exhibition is clearly very popular given the crowds and the length of time people spent looking at each of the hundreds of prints displayed. The curators have done a brilliant job in putting them in context and explaining that they were usually produced in sets of 12 as with so many ukiyo-e prints and would be used as instruction manuals for newlyweds, as foreplay for couples, consolation for the separated and just for a laugh.
Seeing rooms full of people losing their embarrassment while peering at sheet after sheet of bi-gender genitalia having such fun made one doubt whether there’s much British reserve left. There were a few faces around looking a little confused though. The exhibition runs until 5 January 2014 and is well worth a visit.
Following last month’s Japan Foundation lecture on zen in gardens (our own Japanese maples are looking especially fine this year) and ceramics we were keen to find some really elegant cups for green tea consumption. We found them in the most unlikely place while on a two-day break in Wiltshire.
Mike in the gloom at Lacock
We drove down through alternating rain and drizzle, checked in and decided to go and view an outdoor sculpture exhibition at Lacock Abbey. By the time we arrived it was closed and nearly dark anyway, so we wandered around the village – in Cranford, Pride and Prejudice and Harry Potter land – and came across Lacock Pottery. We climbed the stairs to the deserted loft gallery and there were two bowls that were just what we needed. We looked at the other exhibits but kept coming back and eventually rang the bell for service which brought forth David McDowell who filled us in on his own intriguing history as the offspring of a FitzChurchill. After a time he vouchsafed the information that the pots were by a local potter Matt Waite and used a very uncommon glaze called Chün or Jun. It has no colour in itself but when light strikes it it takes on the finest pale blue tone because of reflection on metallic particles in the glaze – fascinating stuff. We bought them, were given a lengthy guided tour of the glorious B&B David and his wife Simone run at the pottery and eventually escaped back for dinner at Marco Pierre White’s latest project Rudloe Arms. It’s work in progress at present but the art from his collection displayed all over the hotel means you could just walk around for hours enjoying the paintings, mobiles, cartoons, photographs and memorabilia.
Dee making a bright – if chilly – start at the hotel
The next day a total contrast in terms of weather but held the same surprises and delights. A bright blue sunny morning dawned – ideal for our planned trip to Bath. We caught the bus from the end of the hotel driveway benefitting from Freedom Passes’ nation-wide (except Scotland – boo – have your independence!) validity for free bus transport and we’d also been warned that Bath was notoriously difficult for parking.
Neither of us had been to Bath for ages and so set out to do the main touristy things: Pump Room, Roman Baths, Assembly Rooms, Fashion Museum and the less well known Museum of East Asian Art which houses a lot of Chinese pottery, lacquer and jade with some good examples of Japanese ceramics too. We scuttled round being close to closing time and then had a long chat in the museum shop to a young Japanese lady with whom we exchanged views about the collection, her enjoyment of the UK and our trip to Japan.
Our need to scuttle was caused by spending much longer than we ever thought we would at the Roman Baths – a truly amazing “visitor attraction” (dreadful phrase). History, archaeology, reconstructions and interactivity coupled with the incredible extent of the site mean that you could easily pass a whole day in the Baths but that would not do justice to Bath which really deserves its World Heritage Site status.
Dee and Mike taking in the Baths Bath’s chandelier-themed lights The real thing in the Assembly Rooms
Back to the hotel on the bus and tonight’s dinner is at another Marco Pierre White pub The Pear Tree about five miles from Rudloe. It’s been part of his empire for three years now and feels much better bedded in – indeed it has eight rooms so you can stay there too. The dining room is in a large conservatory on the side of an old stone pub and very tastefully decorated and designed. Food and wine were up to scratch too.
Then it was back to London but via the workshop of potter Matt Waite whose pots we bought earlier in the week. He didn’t have any others available but undertook to make us two more and to fashion us a sake jug and beakers in a similar style. We await the outcome with bated breath. Matt is interested in oriental ceramics and ancient glazes and produces elegant tableware in a variety of styles but all individually thrown so each pot, cup or bowl is unique. We were pleased to meet him and kept him from his kiln for far too long chatting about travel, pottery and everything under the sun. He was great company and is a fine potter.
Another Japan Foundation discussion evening focused on a Japanese project to catalogue all Japanese art objects in foreign collections – I don’t think it’s a sinister move to demand them all back! It was fascinating to see how many collections there are in stately homes and private houses as well as more accessibly in museums. We’ve ordered a promising-looking book A Guide to Japanese Art Collections in UK which will help us track them down as we travel around. It seems like there’s a good Japanese gallery in the Maidstone Museum which we might get to visit over Christmas.
And as with every blog there has been some more Japanese food. After the Shunga exhibition we paid a return visit to Abeno now with its licence restored so no free beer this time. Despite the availability of okonomiyaki we tried the soba rice which has rice, noodles, meat and vegetables and the yaki soba fried noodles. Both were excellent as were the kari kari renkon – crispy slices of lotus root with sea salt.
Then following the Japan Foundation evening we tried a fairly newly opened restaurant in Coptic Street called Cocoro. It specialises in ramen (noodles) and curry. We had one of each and they were very good – the speciality tonkotsu ramen with pork belly and broth made from stewed pork bone was really tasty. Judging from the salarymen behind us who had clearly been in for a long evening and several other tables occupied by Japanese diners it’s proving a popular addition to the area.
Finally my own first efforts at sushi making have been moderately successful. Taste is good, shape and symmetry leave a lot to be desired. I also made the delicious slightly sweet omelette we use to have frequently for breakfast in Japan. It is great on its own and also makes a good sushi filling. I used it with some roasted pepper in one set of sushi while the others were prawn and avocado.
Dee and I are going on a sushi-making course next year as a Christmas present to ourselves so we hope that rapid progress will be made.
The month was rounded off nicely with some Murakami to add to the mix – he’s been missing a bit lately. In the New Yorker magazine on 28 October a new short story appeared called Samsa in Love. You can read it here and it makes for an good easy introduction to aspects of his world. The combination of disorientation, dysfunction, political edginess and the obvious nod to Franz Kakfa’s The Metamorphosis make for an interesting read. His descriptions of the interaction between Gregor Samsa and a hunchbacked woman with an ill-fitting bra are both poignant and hilarious.
We’ve had a great time, quiet, nine mainly sunny days by the pool. Eating at home because everywhere else means one of us not having a drink so as to drive home along the roads that cry out “mind the eggs”. But we’ve eaten well on local produce and drunk well on local Ciro wines. There have been a few moments of thunder and a couple of quick downpours but on the whole it was just what we needed. There was a well designed garden area with a stone bench that reminded us of Japan and lots of lizards and a few geckos for company.
So we leave our villa today passing what was maligned in a previous post as a wayside fruit stand. It is of course a full blown supermarket with everything we could have wanted and had we looked harder we could probably have avoided our fraught trip to Vibo Valentia last Sunday.
We are going to spend the day and night in another town up the Calabrian coast called Pizzo. We’ve booked into the hotel for one night and reminiscent of early arrivals in Japan earlier this year we have expectations of leaving baggage at the hotel and wandering about until official check in time at 15:30. Pizzo is a warren of undulating winding streets but eventually we hit a free parking space in Piazza Mussolino (note the last vowel) which is walkable to the hotel. However we arrive – sensibly deciding not to take our bags – to find the front door open but a sliding glass door impenetrable. We ring the bell. Niente. We walk about and knock on windows. Niente. We telephone and leave a message on the voicemail and so to the Piazza della Repubblica for a coffee. We’ve not quite ordered when the hotel phones and says we can come now. So we apologize to the patrone, head back to the car and pick up out bags and wheel them along a street of roadworks to the hotel.
Magic! Our room is ready. The hotel is beautiful. The staff are apologetic – they were serving breakfast on the roof terrace and couldn’t get the door – sounds good for tomorrow as breakfast’s included. It’s called the Piccolo Grand Hotel and it’s a perfect description. It has all the elegance and style of a grand hotel but in a converted palazzo that only has 12 rooms.
We ask about parking and are advised that we are best where we are and set off to park up for the day as there’s not much call for driving in Pizzo.
Now you can only buy parking by the hour on a card on which you scratch out the year, day, hour and minute on a foil covered card. And you can only buy cards by the hour. So having decided to stay put we need ten of them at 50 cents each so we sit and scratch and display the whole array in the windscreen. They say it’s OK in the tabacchi where we buy the cards – we’ll see tomorrow if there was a hidden sign saying “No return within one hour”.
Hey ho coffee calls. Il Patrone is pleased and maybe surprised to see us back but we have good coffee and a chocolate croissant for breakfast before exploring the town.
It is a pleasant place with some nice churches, grand – if rather run-down – palazzi and wonderful views of the sea from narrow, angled street corners. The area is famed for its liquorice so we buy a few packs to take home for offices and friends as well as some limoncello flavoured biscuits we think will go down nicely for Friday treats. We go for a prosecco and a beer in the main square before meeting Beata to give her the keys and retrieve our breakages deposit. She arrives, flustered and with many other visitors to attend to and we decide on a local produce shop-cum-restaurant Le Chicche di Calabria for lunch. What a good choice!
We had the Calabrian tasting menu which kept coming – a plate of four or five different cheeses, then a platter of salamis some mild, most quite fiery. For the first time we were presented with our cutlery and napkins in a paper bag. These first courses were the precursor to four bruchettas again two tomato-eyd and the others really hot with the chillies they love so much down in the south. Finally there was the steak – almost a comparable tenderness to the Hida beef we’d tasted in Japan earlier this year. Accompanied by a rosato wine from Ciro region just to the north and finished off with coffee it was an excellent way to spend several hours. We buy a few more bits and pieces from the shop and when we decline a large bottle of local liquorice liqueur our explanation “Ryanair” is greeted with a sage nod of acceptance. Their meagre baggage allowances go before them everywhere it seems. We retired to the hotel which has a lovely small roof terrace for some embroidery in Dee’s case and some reading in mine.
One of the great things about this static, relaxing holiday is that for the first time in ages we’ve been able to read all six of the Booker Prize shortlist – well nearly as according to Kindle I’m 18% through the sixth. For what it’s worth here are some brief observations in order of reading just before the winner is announced:
Ruth Ozeki A tale for the time being A bias has to be admitted because it deals with Japan and Canada in both of which I have an interest but it’s an imaginative look at post-tsunami Japan with further insights into zen and the Japanese character. The writing is not always quite as balanced as I would have liked but it was a compelling read.
Colm Toibin The Testament of Mary My winner by a short head. A beautifully crafted novel with a vivid sense of period and the politics of the birth of Christianity. A stunning concept brilliantly delivered.
NoViolet Bulawayo We need new names Startling and distressing but compelling and for me at least very educational, her stories of kids growing up in Zimbabwe are fresh and have an authentic feel. I found some of the US-set chapters a little less well done but it’s a book I’m very glad to have read.
Jhumpa Lahiri Lowland Again I was always going to enjoy the next book from a writer I already admire and with its settings in Kolkata and New England another two of my interests were featured. A heartbreaking series of stories unfold from her silky pen and I loved it.
Jim Crace Harvest How have I gone all these years without reading Crace? This is my second favourite – unusual for me in that it’s historical again set around the time of the enclosures but it’s love of the land, the politics of medieval poverty and the restless energy of the characters made this a wonderful introduction to an author who will be the subject of multiple downloads soon.
Eleanor Catton The Luminaries This will win because I can’t stand it. I must be the one person in the world who just can’t do Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell offerings which have twice won the Booker and this over-researched, over-written introduction to intrigue in New Zealand’s gold rush falls into the same category. The fastidiousness of the writing with immense effort to achieve a sense of “written at the time” I find very alienating. It leaves me completely frustrated with its lack of energy and I can’t say now that I’ll even bother to finish it. So put your money on this one and ignore my opinions above.
We had been told by several people that La Lampara was the best restaurant in Pizzo and the helpful staff at the hotel called ahead to make sure we could get a table as it is a) small and b) popular. It was great with a shared starter of smoked tuna followed by ricciola for Dee and swordfish for me so we had sampled the three fish the area’s most famous for. Wine choice not brilliant, a not quite dry enough local white but a very pleasant evening in excellent surroundings before retiring to the hotel to blog and discover that England had managed to qualify for the World Cup.
Next morning dawned very wetly. A veritable stream flowed by the hotel’s front door and it was impossible to distinguish sea from land from sky as everything was a uniform grey. Good preparation for our return to London.
Thursday comes and at least we’ve seen the volcano. We go into Tropea, explore a bit more of the town, have a coffee, then park up and have an early lunch down by the port. I choose ricciola a fish I’ve never heard of but am told is special to Sicily and Calabria. It’s texturally a bit like swordfish but with a sharper taste. In English it appears to go by the name of greater amberjack. Dee choose a plate of enormous prawns but even after her Japanese training declined to eat the heads.
We leave and walk to the port to be told we have to re-park our car – in a paying area! It seemed fine to me where it was but the attendant was very insistent. We exchange our trip voucher for tickets with an additional unexplained charge of 3 euros and head for the TropeaMar which is to take us on our trip. There’s great confusion among the throngs on the quayside. The TropeaMar won’t start and we’re going on the Stromboli Express instead. Tickets are exchanged and the Stromboli Express appears at the harbour entrance but there’s nowhere to berth her until some local boats have been moved. An almighty scrum to board takes places and eventually we set off at about 14:40. The view of Tropea up on its bluff is very fine as we leave the harbour.
The weather’s a bit hazy so spotting Sicily and the other islands is a bit difficult. We looked carefully for the promised dolphins but they were obviously in hiding today. We even consult with the bridge but they can’t help.
We can see Stromboli and its little rock Strombolicchio and Lipari and eventually Sicily. We arrive, disembark and are told to be back to the boat for departure sharp at 19:20.
There’s not a lot to do on Stromboli unless you are a trekker-vulcanologist, but we did see a couple of puffs of smoke from the crater that augured well for the night ahead. The beaches are still something of a surprise being completely black – not sure I could do a day lying on a completely black beach. So wandered its narrow tourist-shop-lined streets, leaping to avoid the buzzing three wheelers that are the main form of transport along with golf buggies.
We grabbed a beer and a snack before reporting back to the Stromboli Express as instructed. Some concern to find engineers with the engine room hatch up and the engine coughing like an old banger on a cold morning. However we finally moved off and went round to the back of Stromboli to the optimum place to observe the fireworks. And we wait and we wait. We drift. We turn around and we drift back. Several other expectant boats share the waters. Eventually after an hour the captain apologises for Stromboli not performing tonight and we whizz back to Tropea at full speed. What we do see is an amazing electrical storm over the Calabrian coast with vast areas of cloud lit up by flashes of pink tinged lightning. We couldn’t hear the thunder over the roar of the now full throttle engines – clearly desperate to get back before the curse of the TropeaMar stikes the Stromboli Express. Dolphins nil, Stromboli nil. But a fun and bracing day out on the sea wondering how our dear Captain Toddy is getting on in the tall ships race from Sydney to Auckland. Weather doesn’t look too clever down there either.
So we have provisions, we have a pool, the sun is shining and all’s well with the world. A brief trip of exploration to the beach in Zambrone Mare, dip our toes in the Tyrrhenian Sea and back to sun lotion and kindles by the pool.
After a few hours in the sun we decide it would make sense to head into the nearby town of Tropea – the jewel of Calabria – for a wander and a drink before coming home to cook. We find parking easily, walk into the main square to find the Tourist Information closed – no change there then. We book a boat trip to see Stromboli by night on Thursday on board the TropeaMar. It leaves Tropea Port at 14:00 gives you three hours on Stromboli and then goes to observe the nightly eruption before returning to port. There are several companies competing to take people out to the Aeolian Islands in general and the volcanic Stromboli in particular.
Fortunately the guide book we brought with us has a route for a one hour walk around Tropea which we begin. As we head towards the cathedral it becomes clear we have happened across a military wedding with chaps in blue dress uniforms with red plumes and swords ready to greet one of their own – plus one – as they emerge from the elegant and simple Duomo. The local wedding photographer even promises aerial photos and an amazing helicopter rig takes a camera into the skies to document the event. Confetti and rice are thrown at the couple. The bride looks a bit surprised by the whole thing. They then cram themselves into a tiny vintage Fiat 500 before the usual horn honking passage through the streets.
We continue our walk and fetch up back in Piazza Ercole, the main square for a beer and a glass of wine before driving back to the villa – it’s beginning to get dark and we’re still none too sure of the road. Drinks are fine, price reasonable and accompanied by crisps, nuts and mini bruschetta but we need a comfort break before the drive. One of the guide books did warn us that few loos in restaurants or public places provide toilet paper. Most also don’t have seats or locks. And finding the flush the first time can be demanding – a tiny plunger spigot thing beneath a wall-mounted cistern. Equally, having to first find and then press a foot pedal, which looked like a spanner, to run the water in the handbasin was a surprise – after all if there is no visible tap you just wave your hands under the spout don’t you? After the luxury (and questionable environmental ethics) of heated loo seats and free toiletries in Japan this all came as a bit of an unpleasant shock. If you’re going to Italy make sure a roll of Andrex On the Go is in your hand luggage – thanks Boots’ holiday section.
Next morning we decide we’ll buy some fish from the local fishmonger in Zambrone. It’s a converted garage under a large family house on the outskirts of the village centre. We purchase a kilo of vongole and two lovely looking sea bass. The lady fishmonger takes us up into her garden to pick fresh parsley, basil and celery which she throws into the bag for free. She also counsels us to go to the beach to get some sea water in which to soak the vongole as it will make them open really well prior to cooking.
So we head off for Zambrone Marina with a litre water bottle which I have to empty on the strand. Have you ever tried getting sea water into the neck of a water bottle? When the tide’s coming in? I got very wet. I got about 700 ml of sea water. What was reassuring though was that you couldn’t tell from looking at it that it wasn’t mineral water, so clear is the sea round here.
Another session by the pool and after a shower and a stroll it’s time to cook the vongole with some onions and garlic and a chilli, dubbed in tatty tourist shops ‘Calabrian Viagra’. They are quite hot as are the red onions for which Tropea is famous – lots of tears at the stove.
Off shore are the Aeolian Islands, the most famous of which is Stromboli an active volcano which erupts regularly and predictably – they say. The villa details promise Stromboli views. After two days we hadn’t seen it as it was too hazy out to sea. This evening however we could see Stromboli set off by a gorgeous sunset. Let’s hope it’s like this tomorrow when we go to see Stromboli at play.
Stromboli is the amazingly conical island to the right of frame with the big cloud above looking like it’s just erupted
It’s been a while since I’ve been able to blog – those good people at Maverick provided lots more fun scripts for me to write. But we’ve been pursuing Japanese life in London after hours. Two excellent lectures at the Japan Foundation have rekindled an interest in attending scholarly lectures – and drinking sake. The first was called Place, Memory and the Human Body and was given by Miyako Ishiuchi a fabulous photographer whose fragments of people, places and garments form her own quest for her past and produce memorable, occasionally disturbing images along the way. Her work is in Tate Modern – there’s an interview here – and she’s represented in London by the Michael Hoppen Gallery.
The second was by Allen S Weiss a New York University professor who has made a study of zen elements in Japanese gardens and ceramics. The talk was a launch for his new book and concentrated on the gardens side of things but the book is beautiful and will repay attentive reading in short bursts as the level of philosophical analysis made our brains hurt on a Thursday evening. It features Tofukuji that we visited in Kyoto as well as many others. I’ll never look at an arrangement of stones in quite the same way – fascinating, informative and fun. By an odd coincidence the writer was introduced and questioned by a Japanese gardens expert from Writtle College who was called Dr Jill Raggett. We exchanged cards and will look for the possible relationship which will be on her husband’s side. There seems to be a Hampshire connection so maybe we’re related somehow.
After socialising we went for okonomiyaki in Abeno, the original, having previously enjoyed a post theatre evening in sister restaurant Abeno Too. It was well up to standard with an autumn menu featuring a starter of kari kari renkon crispy, spicy lotus root that look like mini cartwheels, autumnal agedashi tofu and the main yamazatoyaki featuringburdock, bacon and mushrooms of many kinds – all delicious.
Two days later, 5 October, was Japan Matsuri London a festival of music, arts and crafts, martial arts and food which takes over Trafalgar Square in London for the day. The opening involved speeches from a number of luminaries – the highly inspiring Japanese ambassador, London’s deputy mayor – we were spared Boris – and a number of folk in costume representing the historic links between Japan and the UK. Much congratulating of London for inspiring Tokyo’s successful bid for Olympics and Paralympics 2020.
The ambassador speaks The Choshu Five and William Adams
It was the 400th anniversary of the establishment of the first British trading post in Japan by William Adams a sailor from Gillingham so he was there. It was also the 150th anniversary of the first Japanese to come to study in London at University College. They were called the Choshu Five and they were there. They proved influential in the modernization of Japan and opening it to the west.
The event was launched by the smashing of a sake barrel – not quite as dramatic as it should have been because the planks on top had already been disturbed. However a campai from all on the platform drinking from the traditional wooden sake cups got everything off to a flying start.
Sake poured and … Campai!
We wandered round the stalls, watched a kendo display with explanatory commentary, met people in traditional Imperial costume and went to watch brilliant displays of drumming from students at the Japanese School in Acton and by the London Okinawa Sanshinkai. There were lots more performances but we needed to head home, pack and set off to Stansted to catch an early flight to Lamezia Terme in southern Italy.
Arrival in Italy was fine. Flight on time to much applause from Ryanair crew, desultory from passengers. Car as described for once although a huge queue at Firefly rental desk – shared with Hertz who had no takers. Lesson about rates? TomTom installed and we set off for Zambrone where the villa we’ve rented is situated. We drive down a poor motorway with road works, two narrow lanes and fairly soon reach a turn off for Zambrone.
Trouble is like Gaul according to Caesar (Book 1 De bello gallico) Zambrone in tres partes divisa est. It may even be more as we came across the sign for Madama which is described as a fraction of Zambrone. The villa agent Beata was waiting to conduct us to the villa by Zambrone station but the SatNav took us to Zambrone Superiore. The station of course is in Zambrone Marina, It took us a while to sort out who was where but we did meet up and checked into our home for the next ten days.
It has a well equipped kitchen – always important for us – comfortable beds and a great pool with sun loungers aplenty. Looking good. One small problem though. We flew in through a thunderstorm and it’s pretty murky now. However the forecast is better with 28 and 30 promised for next weekend.
As it’s Sunday afternoon and we have no food and are unsure of local restaurant hours (if any) we decide to go and do a big shop. We had seen signs along the road for Vibo Center with the magic appendage domenica aperto, open on Sundays.
So we set TomTom for Vibo. On the way we pass a roadside fruit stall – excuse me Supermercato – where we stop and get some local rosato wine which later proves very palatable in its unlabelled litre bottle for 2 euros 50. We buy eggs, potatoes and onions and press on. As we approach we discover that again Vibo is multi-located. We find the Marina bit but there’s no sign of a Spar and we redirect to Vibo Valentia Centro. It’s miles away and what TomTom doesn’t know is that one of the roads is closed. Round and round in circles we go until finally we fetch up in Vibo Valentia where signs to the Spar are intermittent but pop up just when you’ve despaired. By now it’s absolutely throwing the rain down and we scuttle into the covered parking and make our way into the mall with its avenue of boutiques and then a massive supermarket. We stock up and are attracted by the roast chicken spit against the far wall where we buy tonight’s dinner.
We set TomTom for its newly designated favourite location and are told it’ll be half an hour – not bad. Oh what a ride. Completely cross country, along tiny winding roads in the hastening dark.
Portions of the road were unmade and elicited cries of “mind the eggs” from my navigator – they were only in a bag not an egg box. We pass through Zambrone village which we’d seen before and at the side of a dark road in no man’s land are told “You have reached your destination”. It took us a while to find the road on which the villa is located but then we tucked into a herby and delicious chicken, good wine and cheese and felt a little more like we were on holiday not doing a team building orienteering course. On unpacking we found that five of the six eggs had survived.
What brilliant news that the Olympic Games in 2020 are going to Tokyo. Great bid, brilliant city and a wonderful UFO from Zaha Hadid to come. While we were there we saw lots of publicity for Tokyo’s bid with banners all over the city, on the streets, in parks and not surprisingly draped from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.
Above: In Hibiya Park with a topiary swan TopRight: On Aoyama dori
Right: On the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building
Below: On lamp posts all over the city
Congratulations also to Tokyo for selecting the best logo of the three candidate cities. It was designed by Ai Shimamine a fourth year student at Joshibi University of Art and Design in the west of Tokyo. She won a competition arranged by the bid committee which attracted 38 entries. Her design features a wreath of cherry blossom flowers in the Olympic colours. We all know how important cherry blossom is to the Japanese people and Ai’s logo signifies “eternity, happiness and a continuous unbroken cycle, while also symbolizing Japan’s recovery from the March 11 earthquake and tsunami”.
I bought a tee shirt and Dee a badge when we visited the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Centre. The badge is on Dee’s ubiquitous pink bag and I wore my tee shirt as a good omen to the Olympic Park Anniversary Games in London back in July (logo obscured by Go Peacock sign sadly) where we also rooted strongly for Mami Sato the paralympic long jumper who comes from Fukushima and was an ambassador with the bid team in Buenos Aires. She described how 200 athletes had visited thousands of children in the Fukushima area and enthused them with a passion for sport.
Extensive existing facilities, fun and legacy were the cornerstones of the Tokyo bid and of course the Prime Minister Shinzo Abe – “he gets everywhere” commented one friend in Tokyo when he threw first pitch at a baseball game – lived up to his reputation by jetting from St Petersburg at the G20 to Buenos Aires to reassure the IOC that pollution from Fukushima has not and will not affect Tokyo.
So we’ll be applying for volunteer jobs to show English speaking tourists around the Games in 2020 and share our enthusiasm for Japan with anybody who will listen.
I've been meaning to do an update on my amazing big birthday for ages
but work has intervened as have football (great start to the season)
cricket (Ashes won and Hampshire in T20 finals again) and a social life.
Just before my birthday an advertising agency Maverick asked me to go
in for an extended interview as a writer and I ended up staying there
all day and apart from my birthday itself, most of the next three weeks.
It was an interesting experience being in a big office after years of
working on my own or with just a small team and I thoroughly enjoyed
it and look forward to more. So here it is - only a month late!
So the big trip to Japan was my birthday present from Dee and from me. That started in April and was – as you’ll have seen if you’ve read earlier blogs – something of a success. It exceeded our expectations by a serious factor, included a birthday dinner for both of us at Alain Ducasse’s Spoon in Hong Kong with my son and daughter-in-law and was quite enough excitement for an oldie.
Writing about it, editing the photographs and video clips kept the memories alive for May after we returned and most of June. Then some serious work for some extremely pleasant publishers from the Netherlands intruded – but hey, it’s all got to be paid for somehow. We had loved Leandro Erlich’s swimming pool in Kanazawa and managed to get to the Dalston House installation. His immersive (no pun intended) art is great fun and at the Dalston House we were amazed by several groups with carefully rehearsed and choreographed routines for their five minutes of fame. Our were more modest and tentative but great fun and a reminder of good times in Kanazawa and it was as hot too. Then we had a wonderful birthday dinner with Ilse at La Luna di Luca in Richmond where owner Martina prepares a menu of regional Italian food – Sicily in our case – and course followed delicious course during several delightful hours.
And so the celebrations went on and on – and suddenly we were in July and the birthday itself was upon us. On a day of most propitious sunshine and light breeze, my daughter and son-in-law took us to Glyndebourne for a performance of Hippolyte et Aricie an opera by Rameau that I’d never seen (you can see it online on the Glyndebourne website). We had an afternoon tea picnic on the lawns – proper stuff: cucumber sandwiches, scones, strawberry jam and clotted cream complemented by a fine bottle of Nyetimber Classic Cuvée, appropriately grown, made and bottled in Sussex.
The week before I had had an email from Majestic Wine Warehouses to tell me I’d won six bottles of this fine wine which outperforms many champagnes in wine tastings and competitions. I think I’d had to enter my email address and tell them where Nyetimber was. Very nice competition – thank you Nyetimber, thank you Majestic. And we could tell why it wins medals – it was oishii (delicious in Japanese) – very crisp on the tongue, nicely dry but with good fruit flavour. The opera was brilliantly staged and sung and with William Christie conducting the OAE the music was always going to be outstanding. A fabulous dinner in the interval, a glass of wine afterwards and being driven back to London – what more could anyone ask for on their 70th?
But that was only phase two. Saturday was spent opening a huge pile of parcels from friends and relatives the generosity of which was astounding. I won’t do an exhaustive list but a Neal’s Yard cheese experience, whisky and a whisky tasting, books about jazz, Japanese architecture, Japanese cooking, a sushi making kit and the most beautiful proper old fashioned watering can, huge quantities of garden vouchers, theatre tokens and a cellar full of wine and beer demonstrate the skill of all concerned in matching their gifts to my tastes – although I suspect collusion with my wife in some cases especially when it came to a long handled shoehorn which I have so admired in hotels in Japan – you don’t have to bend down!
Saturday afternoon and evening was spent in the company of more than 80 friends and relatives with ages ranging from one to 85 and it was wonderful. The excellent Union Club in Soho had been booked as the venue by Dee and they pulled out all the stops to make it a brilliant occasion. We’ve had so many emails from people who also enjoyed it that I now know it wasn’t just me. The food was excellent, liquid refreshment flowed and I had a chance to catch up with everybody – if only briefly with any one group. The young people present did a brilliant job getting everyone to sign a giant birthday card. I even had birthday cakes and the real surprise for me – my face on the label of a case of Harvey’s 1943 Birthday Ale specially commission by the mastermind of the whole occasion, Dee. Wow have you set the bar high for yours! But thank you for an absolutely fabulous continuing birthday celebration.
SOME RANDOM BIRTHDAY PARTY PHOTOS
A calming beer to start with.
Early arrivals in the bar
Food was served upstairs
There was a speech and kind words from absent friends and the mega birthday card
Fun was had with friends, family and neighbours
And then there was the big surprise
] Of course many more people had brought gifts to the party so Sunday morning was spent with a glass of champagne to celebrate our wedding anniversary while opening the remaining presents which continued to surprise, amaze and delight. We set off – Dee and myself, her sister, brother-in-law and nephew for a late lunch where I, at last, was allowed to contribute by providing our anniversary celebration. We went to Chapter One, a Michelin-starred restaurant in the strangely named Locksbottom, travelling ecologically on the 261 bus. I was trying to get its website up on my phone to call to say we were running a few minutes late but the mobile site wasn’t working well so I couldn’t. However I did get an inaccurate look at the dress code which caused me to panic about all three males being in shorts, natural we thought, on a very hot Sunday afternoon, but it is quite a posh place. Mild Mike panic ensued but fortunately they allowed shorts if they are ‘tailored’ which ours obvious were – well sort of. Relaxed and seated at a good table, we had another gift. Because of an error at the bar our aperitifs arrived after our first course and were announced to be on the house. I do like it when people who make mistakes don’t argue but just take it off the bill. The rest of the meal was as good as you’d expect from a Michelin-star-worthy chef and a fine afternoon was spent out in the wilds of Bromley.
So apart from the trip itself, a definite Japan theme was evident in many of my birthday presents. We chose to extend this the next weekend with a trip to Hyper Japan at Earl’s Court. We’d never been before but were amazed by the size and scope of the displays and activities. Computer games and manga we’d expected, food stalls of every kind too, but the huge numbers of people in costume as manga characters was astounding. It was a bit, I’m told, like a sci-fi convention with people posing for photographs, chatting in bizarre groups and generally having a great time. We’d seen a bit in Japan but had no clue as to just how big cosplay was. There were martial arts demonstrations too and some fabulous drumming – Eisa from Okinawa I discovered with shimasen players and dancers as well as the drummers.
On Sunday 28 we went to the Olympic Stadium to see the paralympic athletes in action. It was the first visit to the Olympic Stadium for Dee and me and we understood why everyone had been so enthusiastic in 2012. It is a great space with a better atmosphere than at Wembley for the playoff final. What is proposed for its future is a travesty and should be stopped. I note there is a page on Facebook and an e-petition to the DCMS but neither has much support so I guess West Ham and the philistines will march on with their annihilation of this iconic space. As we tried to settle up with Elaine who had organised the tickets we were told they were a present too – so on and on it goes!
I went to see my daughter and the grandchildren the next day to drop off Daisy’s birthday card and wish them a good holiday trip to Boston and Cape Cod (only slightly jealous!) and came home with yet another present – a cherry tree so we can have our very own hanami season at home in future and have no further need of going to Japan to see cherry blossom.
The 
We had been told by several people that La Lampara was the best restaurant in Pizzo and the helpful staff at the hotel called ahead to make sure we could get a table as it is a) small and b) popular. It was great with a shared starter of smoked tuna followed by ricciola for Dee and swordfish for me so we had sampled the three fish the area’s most famous for. Wine choice not brilliant, a not quite dry enough local white but a very pleasant evening in excellent surroundings before retiring to the hotel to blog and discover that England had managed to qualify for the World Cup.
