Random Play by Graham Reid

TUESDAY, November 29: Woke up, fell out of bed, dragged a comb across my head. Made my way downstairs to station at Dullerstrasse, tall man in overcoat asks for directions and only then realise I have forgotten to become fluent in German in this past year. But he is speaking French. Am late for meeting with NZ arts councilperson in town. Rehearse my pitch for book about ex-pat’s reflections on New Zealand: working title Home Thoughts From A Broad. Not really. Should be very Mansfield I think. Strange man looks at me in train. Wait in lobby of Boozenstrasse Hotel with distressed Turks, weary Arabs and an Asian boy. Must remember to include this in next column for weekly magazine back home. Shown to room by large German man with handlebar moustache. Note to self: why do all men I meet in Berlin have moustaches? Idea for essay perhaps. Meet Jane in her room, it is room 278. Go for coffee on Ratkellerstrasse. She wearing black jacket and polo necked sweater. Discreet Maori motif on lapel. Suddenly remember appointment with art gallery owner who wants to take me to Vienna. Leave Jane with manuscript book of ideas. Agree to meet tomorrow for lunch. Exit coffee shop in rush and look for nearest station. It is 150 metres away. Walk past section of old Wall, man in uniform outside a shop, two boys skateboarding. Buy apple at small shop where I am served by a large man with no moustache. Wonder if this is deliberate? Arrive at Leon’s gallery just as he is leaving. “Take me with you,” I say, and he says “Of course”. Fly to Vienna. Good flight, nice coffee. I also eat a bun with jam. Meet freelance writer from Austria at dinner. Hotel room has red curtains.

Very strange. Next morning am late for breakfast and forget to pack hairbrush. Only discover this at airport. Buy another one -- black with a faux-leather handle -- and get on plane. Rehearse ideas for arts council. Back in Berlin to meet Jane. Busy and very interesting few days. Must remember to write this up for weekly column. After lunch of rice and egg, headed home. Went up stairs. Passed loud neighbours on balcony. Woman had a handlebar moustache. Got inside small flat. Sat down. Drank a cup. Then somebody spoke and I went into a dream.

* The usual disclaimers apply

I only ever saw George Best twice: once on a soccer field, and once in a bar. Given that his life had two distinct periods -- the short time (only six years) he wove his magic around opponents on a pitch and the rest when he lived under the bottle, they seem appropriate memories to hold on to.

As I write this George remains in critical condition in a hospital, from which he is not expected to emerge. It is very sad.

Best was a brilliant soccer player and a heroic drinker. He was also an alcoholic, which -- despite what some might think -- is a condition over which the victim has little control.

As alcoholics will tell you, they may stop drinking but they will always have the predilection for the addiction.

So it wasn’t really that surprising that not long after Best had his famous liver transplant he was back on the bottle.

There was an outcry: how dare he after all that had been done for him?

Well, maybe he didn’t have much choice, I don’t know. But there is another view of that opinion: there are few things worse than actions -- especially charitable or humanitarian ones -- which come with conditions.

Consider: we’ll give you the war widows’ pension on the condition you don’t spend it on gin down at the RSA with your friends.

We’ll send aid to famine and flood victims as long as they only use it for food and don’t fritter it away rebuilding their churches and temples.

We’ll let you have a liver transplant as long as you . . .

Coincidentally -- and I guess it is ironic -- it looks like Best will die just as the new drinking laws are being debated in Britain. Doubtless his life will be held up as a warning, which will be amusing given the string of blondes he escorted and enjoyed.

And now for something completely different: Coldplay are a band whose music I don’t mind but can’t get passionate about. But I can understand the disappointment for their legion of fans here that the band have the opportunity to come in June but can’t -- or won’t -- because the new Vector Arena isn’t going to be completed in time.

They’ve got a petition together (actually the promoter and record company have) to hurry on construction. Well good luck with that one, kids.

But what annoyed me was the way this, as with similar entertainment stories about our lack of venues, has been essayed on television.

The other night the presenter said that not only was Coldplay affected by the stadium being incomplete but bands like the Rolling Stones who were considering coming here might also be in doubt.

Pardon?

I don’t wish to rain on anyone’s petition or media moment but let’s get some perspective here: the Rolling Stones, if they come, would not be thinking about a venue which only holds 12,000. To cart their gear and entourage over here they -- like U2, Springsteen, Metallica and maybe even Coldplay -- would need something considerably larger, like Ericsson Stadium or Western Springs.

Any talk of the Stones in this context is nonsense, but then again in these matters I am used to hearing nonsense.

I live near Eden Park and a year or so ago there was talk about the place being used for concerts over summer. Those behind the idea said there would only be four a season, and I don’t have any great objection to that.

Sure it will be noisy, but four nights over summer I can tolerate. I might even go to some of them.

What annoyed me however was in the case they were making they emphasised these concerts would not be of the metal mayhem/monsters of rock type but more family events like Paul McCartney.

I seem to recall Sir Paul’s name was bandied about a fair bit -- perhaps because he is gentrified and so is his audience.

But as far as I know Macca has not expressed any burning desire to come here, and in fact in the wake of September 11 he cancelled shows in Australia. Frankly, I doubt McCartney will be one of the four acts over summer should they ever eventuate.

The promotion of the concert idea was deliberately misleading and softening people up. So while I have to accept there will be people pissing in the hedges up and down our street after a show I’d like a little more clarification about just what acts specifically, and audience, we could expect.

Hey, maybe it would be really polite Coldplay fans who would pick up the litter and empties left by the rugger-buggers?

Finally back to George Best: the latest as I write is that he might not last the day.

I hope when he passes on that equal weight is given to struggle he had with the bottle, not just the pleasure he took from it -- or the pleasure he gave when he banged the ball into the back of a net.

I for one will raise a glass to life that was in equal parts genius, hilarious and tragic. And I'll remember when I saw him, he was on top form both times.

No doubt that great story will be told over and over again: how, in his second career, he called for room service at some swanky hotel.

The young man brought in the champagne and there was Best, sprawled on the bed with Miss Universe and wads of cash strewn around.

“George,” said the young man, “Where did it all go wrong?”

Well, that two months went far too quickly: from London to Berlin, then Paris and Bordeaux, a drive across to Uzes and on down through Venice, Florence, Rome and Naples to Sorrento where we picked up a car and drove down into the heel of the boot, back up the east coast and across again to Naples. Flight back to London, then to Singapore for a few days r’n’r at my sister’s place and then back here to . . .

Well, before I left I recall writing a blog in which I said that whenever I come back things seem pretty much the same: every woman on Queen St is wearing black, Dave Dobbyn is winning awards and some opposition politician is telling me how shitty things are.

We came to find Dave had picked up another gong, that Fashion Week had come and gone and nothing had changed, and . . . The rest you can guess.

We knew very little of what was happening in New Zealand during those two blissful months of long lunches, old churches and modern architecture, good conversations and the occasional lousy bed.

There was a paragraph in a London paper saying Jonah Lomu was looking to play for an overseas club (I thought he already was) and then in Naples we caught CNN and a running thread across the bottom said the New Zealand finance minister thought our dollar was over-valued. We just about exploded at that one having watched it convert in euros and, worse, English pounds.

We were in Singapore and my sister told us Winston Peters was foreign minister. We all laughed -- but then realised she was serious. She and her German-born partner have lived for years in Australia so she explained to him that this was like Australia having Pauline Hanson as foreign minister. We would have liked to have disagreed.

So we come back to that farce and cannot imagine how bizarre those post-elections must have been. And can‘t be bothered going back through old Herald’s to find out. Not that we could, much of it might be “premium content” -- as is my stuff these days.

I did hear about that via e-mail while I was away (in Paris, at which point it is hard to take seriously. I was more concerned about the tornado that ripped through our apartment block which according to the cryptic message from the woman staying our place “turned everything upside down everywhere, but everything is alright“).

So I came to “premium content” -- which on paper sounds very flattering -- but am pleased to report that I have already negotiated with the relevant person there and walked away with exactly what I wanted. Papers need to be signed but when they are I shall let you know just in case you wanted to check out some of my previous travel writing and not have to pay for the pleasure.

And I hope it is a pleasure, believe me it is my pleasure to be out there in the world traipsing around picking up stories for various publications -- and maybe my next travel book.

At which point I now give a naked pre-Christmas plug for Postcards From Elsewhere (which is available through this website, thank you Russell).

I returned to see, for the first time, an account of how many books had been sold -- and I was impressed. If it hadn’t been for Harry Potter and Michael King’s book I coulda been a contender.

A friend of mine told me that he’d bought a copy and “It’s really good,” he said enthusiastically and as if surprised. I was sort of flattered and mildly insulted at the same time.

A chapter -- about going to Clarksdale in Mississippi, the home of the blues, and staying in the hotel where Bessie Smith died -- has been picked up by A Famous Rock Music Website (more details when that is finalised) and this being the beach and backyard lazing season there is some belief that the book could get a new wave of interest.

It’s that kind of thing, and neither CK Stead nor that offshore bore Ms Mansfield need feel threatened by my modest effort.

Anyway we are back and full of questions: Like when did the tele-blondes start going brunette (again?): when did Kerre Woodham become reinvented as a cultural commentator; if Judy Bailey has been “dumped” as I keep hearing why is she still on the tele . . .

Finally, we were back in time for The Great Blend and I have to say hats off to Russell and all those who pulled that one off: intelligent and thought-provoking talk, decent wine, good nibbles, lotsa nice people . . .

I am back, and proud to be associated with this website. So next time I will be much less self-serving.

Righto, I have to write something for Lonely Planet who seem keen to secure my services, someone generous has made me a travel offer I can’t refuse, my website needs a huge overhaul because of lots more content arriving soon and I have no idea where to start, and I still have dozens of stories from Europe which need considering.

Yep, time for a cup of tea and a lie down.

Hmmm, Naples? Noisy, polluted, edgy, crowded . . . My kinda town I think.

But it is very, very good to be home.

A glancing encounter with CNN in a Paris hotel room brought back memories: the images showed smalltown Cameron in southwest Louisiana washed away by Hurricane Rita. It seemed tragic and . . .

Well, let me tell you my memory of Cameron, a place we stayed in for one very long night last year while driving down to the Gulf Coast before heading up to Breaux Bridge then on to New Orleans.

Cameron is in shrimp and petroleum country -- and stinks of both. It is is not a pretty smell. But then again, Cameron was not a pretty town.

After checking in at a local motel, during which time fat and irritating maybugs invaded the car and then the room when we opened the doors, I decided to check out a local bar in the hope of chatting with some friendly hometown folk.

The Sports Bar had three people in it: a nuggety guy with a long braid and tatts, a fat and foul-mouthed middle-aged woman, and a guy I took to be her husband.

I ordered a beer from the barmaid who plonked it down and walked away. This was surprising because everywhere else I had been -- from LA across Texas -- my accent usually drew comment.

But not in Cameron.

So I supped my beer and listened while the the tough guy -- who turned out to be a woman -- talked about who had just been killed on the highway, lost an arm in a rigging accident, and the best way to cook shrimp.

The bar was dark and uninviting, much like the company, but I ordered another beer just to see what might eventuate.

When I did the fat guy spun around on his stool and said, Hey, where you from?

I told him, and he said, Huh, I thought you wuz from Iceland.

Then he turned his back on me again.

I decided this was not an especially interesting bar or company so went across the road to another.

Same thing. The ancient bar woman slammed down my beer like I had been an imposition on her valuable time and went back to her conversation with three equally ancient cronies, one of whom had taken his teeth out and put them on the bar while he sipped his soup.

And their conversation? They were arguing about the best way to cook shrimp.

Now I dunno about you, but I would have thought that if you lived in a shrimp town you might have figured that out some time ago.

So I left the bars of Cameron, fought my way through the stink and the bugs back to the motel across from the scrapyard of metal and shrimp boats and said to Megan that we might make an early start in the morning.

Cameron is now underwater and I have ambivalent feelings about that.

However I do worry about nearby Breaux Bridge on the bayou which might also be flooded. We had a wonderful time there -- and I have been in touch with a military medic from there who was posted to Iraq and at the end of his tour a month ago came home, only to go straight on duty again in drowned New Orleans.

I put the Herald in touch with him, I hope they have found him and got his remarkable story.

And here is a shameless plug. In my book Postcards From Elsewhere I write about Breaux Bridge. It might make interesting reading in the light of recent events.

Righto, that is it. We are staying in a luxurious vineyard outside Bordeaux and I have had a whole lobster for lunch, am off to the winebar and maybe a swim in the pool before dinner and cigars.

Home and elections seem a long way away. Big ups to the guy who wrote after the last posting and wondered why we did not just have a penalty shoot-out.

Au revoir.

Well, one newspaper said the country was in crisis because of the uncertain election result, and another said that the voters had lost the opportunity for some necessary reforms.

And of course the two protagonists were all over the television looking assured and ready to form a coalition with whoever from some rag-tag parties who might now be essential for their survival.

There was a lot of coming and going: She with Them and He with Them ... and plenty of pundits being interviewed on television. She was looking happy and tough-minded, he pretty much the same.

What a worry.

But oddly enough the country itself didn't feel like it was in crisis. Sure the currency fell a little, but mostly people went about their business as usual.

Down by the parliament tourists took photos of its distinctive domed architecture and the guys cleaning the windows were laughing and waving at the cameras. If there was a crisis, no one had told these people.

So we went about our day in the slightly crisp weather, and by lunchtime when we were having a beer had forgotten entirely that there was a sort of hung-election, and that somewhere behind closed doors people were wheeling and dealing.

Anyway, that's what's happening in Germany right now: a really close election result . . . and people still carrying on with life.

So, how are things in Kiwiland?