Would you Adam and Eve it?

There’s a quote by P. G. Wodehouse that I think sums up my situation today. It goes thus:

I was left in no doubt as to the severity of the hangover when a cat stamped into the room.

Despite a substantial breakfast at the excellent Mike’s Café in Notting Hill (in my not inconsiderable experience, the severity of the hangover increases with the amount of time it’ll take you to get home), despite a long nap, despite having as many painkillers as is considered sensible for a person to have, it’s still with me. I choose to blame everyone except me. Particularly those damn bar staff, forcing me to buy Jägerbombs by having them there, all for sale and that.

Hold, let’s rewind and examine how I got into this situation in the first place. Along the way we will learn about some interesting bars in the West End.

You see, a friend is over from Germany, and therefore Becky B suggested a trip to the Adam and Eve in Fitzrovia. I was a little suspicious of the place (it describes itself as being based in “Noho” rather than Fitzrovia, a forced neologism that sets my teeth on edge) but was willing to bow to Becky’s recommendation. When I got there, the others were late. Curious, I asked the barman where the reserved table was. He said there was no such reservation. This was strange to me. I got a call a little later from Seb saying that they had arrived and had an entire area reserved. Now, okay, possibly the barman wasn’t aware.

However, the bar staff continued to fail to impress for the rest of the evening. One of them seemed very angry at my chums for showing up late – well, granted, it’s not great if we’re late for a reservation, but this fellow was complaining that they had turned people away because they were expecting us on time. Now, this was, I’m sorry to say, utter bollocks. The place was half empty, which for a bar off Oxford Street is amazing. If they were turning people away, that was stupid of them. And if it was really such a problem to keep the place reserved and empty, they could have un-reserved it. In either case, it’s not considered the done thing to berate your customers in such a fashion.

Another member of staff also complained to some of our chums having a smoke outside that the other staff had got the ashtrays messed up, which again is not the done thing in a customer service environment – it reflects badly on the venue as much as on any individual.

The place stopped serving at 10.30. This is strikingly early for a pub, particularly in the West End, but it’s their venue I suppose. Except that one of our party went up to get a round of drinks at 10.20 and was told that he couldn’t. When we went to investigate this strange state of affairs, for we had received no indication of last orders, the barman (the same one who told me they didn’t have our reservation) said, and I quote, “What’s in it for us if we do serve another round?” The correct answer to such an insolent question from a bartender is, “By god, you whelp of a diseased whore, I don’t know whether I’m more inclined to whip you for your impertinence or your master for his negligence, you will fetch me my drink or feel the toe of my boot up your backside!” but I restrained myself.

We did, with no end of complaints from the staff, get our drinks in the end. If it was really such an issue, they should simply have not served us. To serve us and complain and give us lip is quite beyond the pale. In conclusion, the Adam and Eve is shit.

Fortunately, Becky had an ace up her sleeve, and we went on to a basement cocktail bar on Rathbone Place rejoicing in the unusual name of Bourne and Hollingsworth. This was much more up my street. It’s a small venue, the preferred term I think is “intimate,” and the decor is very eclectic. More than one reviewer (and a member of our party) described it as being “like your grandmother’s house.” How they know what my grandmother’s house looks like is a mystery to me. The cocktail menu was superb, I am told by my cocktail-drinking friends. I stuck to beer myself. It did suffer from that cocktail bar disease of charging the price of a pint for a bottle, but the selection of lagers was suitably offbeat without being controversial. Oh, and kudos to the DJ for his taste in retro music.

When this place closed, Becky once more led the way – this time to an utterly charming place on Charing Cross Road, a members-only theatre bar known as the Phoenix Artist’s Club. I fell in love with the place instantly, it’s a proper boho old-school West End boozer. I’d love to say something meaningful about it, but by the end of the night I was utterly trashed and dancing like a twat. I should apologise to everyone who was forced to listen to me singing along to ‘Stars,’ as I recall my justification at the time was that “Les Miserables is fucking awesome.” 

When the bar closed, the survivors staggered through the ruins of the Gay Pride event to get a cab back to Becky’s place in Notting Hill. I forget exactly how things ended, although I did wake on the floor, staring at a bra (I don’t think it was mine). Hungover as all hell, we grabbed breakfast at Mike’s Café on Blenheim Crescent. Mike’s is an extremely old-skool place that offers a very hearty breakfast at a very reasonable price – I accessorised mine with one of their gorgeous milkshakes. With Notting Hill increasingly falling prey to chains, it’s good to know you can still get something really special.

Now I’m off back to bed. Goodnight.

I am hardcore

It’s been a funny sort of week, comrades. My grandpa’s funeral was on Tuesday, Hurricane Jack returned to the country on Friday, work has been stressy as the Dickens and in between a lot of strange things have been happening. The plan this weekend was therefore to relax as much as possible, which hasn’t quite happened.

Friday, as I say, was marked by the return of Hurricane Jack, who has been mentioned in passing in these pages before. This was celebrated in the traditional manner, i.e. helping to take care of the nation’s alcohol surplus. During the course of this evening, I was introduced to a place in Twickenham known as the Koyote bar. I suspect I was not really the target audience for the place, which is rather noisy and features scantily-clad young ladies dancing on the bar. On the plus side, it’s open late, entry is free and alcohol is at pub prices – I think most of the people in there who weren’t actively on stag nights were taking advantage of these facts, though there were one or two who seemed to be entirely there for the femininity on display. Why they’d go there when there’s a strip club down the road I don’t know.

The night ended with a trip back to Hurricane Jack’s place in Teddington, where we talked a lot of crap, ate some food and watched Thunderbirds at four in the morning. We speculated that Gordon Tracy has so little to do that he actually purposely loses his family’s possessions so that he can “rescue” them later in front of everybody. Sad really.

I eventually got to bed at six, which I believe officially means that I was up all night (Yeah! Still got it!), and strolled into Kingston via Hampton Wick, pausing only to stick my head into the vintage shop that’s opened there. No menswear, though, so continued into Kingston. I bought a really rather delicious brownie in the market, which I will pretend I did because I needed to get rid of the hangover and because I was supporting independent traders or something, but in reality it’s because I just like eating brownies. Brownie as in interestingly-textured chocolate cake, not as in young girl scout. I mean, obviously, right?

I came across a Louis Wain print in the antique market, which I would dearly love to own but can in no way justify spending money on. If any of you have enjoyed this blog so much that you’d like to give me £90 for no reason, drop me a line.

The evening was set aside for a Boys’ Night In at Shoinan’s place out in West London. Shoinan himself describes the area as being undistinguished, but I think it has a certain J. G. Ballardesque charm, but then, as I’ve described in previous entries, my taste in urban landscapes may not be entirely normal.

As well as shooting the shit, drinking a lot of beer and getting through enough Mini Cheddars to kill lesser men, we watched a few of those movies that between us, we missed out on.

Brief review:

Forgetting Sarah Marshall = Good

Scott Pilgrim vs The World = Alright, but definitely a case of style over substance.

Black Dynamite = If you have not seen this film, I order you to go away right now and watch it.

Once again, I totally failed to get to bed at a sensible time, this time finally crashing into bed at some time after seven. I am officially hardcore. What this did mean was that my original plans for today had to be curtailed somewhat – I did have to nip into town. On the way I fed my burgeoning addiction to frozen yogurt at Yog, a small chain of whimsical frozen yogurt shops that should in no way be confused with Snog, which is a small chain of whimsical frozen yogurt shops.

The Byocup

While in Fitzrovia, I saw a product known as the Byocup on sale in one of the shops. This is essentially a response to the problem of wastage that comes about as a result of the huge number of disposable coffee cups that get thrown away every day. The idea behind the Byocup is that it’s like a disposable coffee cup, except that it’s reusable. It’s made of silicon, and so won’t burn your hands when filled with hot coffee. Whereas you would throw a disposable coffee cup away, with the Byocup you simply wash it and reuse it.

Actually, I had a similar idea myself about a year ago. Although I thought that, given that the cup was supposed to be a lifetime’s possession, I could go to town a bit more on features – not slavishly adhere to the design of the disposable cup. My version was ceramic, and had the added design features of a sturdy base and a handle. A photo of the prototype may be seen on the right.

After sticking my head into Cass Art in Berwick Street, I encountered a drug dealer who tried to sell me some hash. I didn’t actually realise he was talking to me – he just sort of ambled around in a circle that happened to intersect with my path while mumbling about “hash” and “weed.” When I didn’t react, he became upset and accused me of being rude and snobbish. This means that I achieved the unusual accolade of being one of the few people against whom a drug dealer felt able to take the moral high ground. I am a “bad ass.”

Advice for the youth of today

You know what’s weird? Yesterday I was feeling bored and depressed, and today I’m feeling comparatively cheerful and motivated. What’s that all about, eh?

Anyway, on my way home I stopped in at the Fitzrovia branch of Tesco to pick up some dinner, because fuckit it’s my birthday tomorrow and I don’t feel like cooking. And while there, I witnessed an altercation that made me feel mildly superior.

Now, I’m no stranger to altercations in Tesco. I well remember the time I entered the Colliers Wood branch at 4am, pleasantly sozzled and in need of a sandwich, only to have to duck to avoid a low-flying shopping basket. I can understand that customers can get a bit lairy, particularly when they’ve had a skinful and are angry and/or horny, but I really don’t think there’s any need for the checkout staff to join in the spat, particularly when I just want a goddamn BLT and a bottle of Pepsi, dammit. I considered complaining, but then the automatic checkout in another branch malfunctioned and gave me £20, so I decided that was quits.

Anyway, the altercation I witnessed in the Fitzrovia branch was much less lively and much more commonplace, though no less loud. Essentially, it revolved around a couple of chavettes who didn’t have any ID with them and were attempting to buy booze (a bottle of some sort of lethal-looking spirit, possibly Jeyes Fluid – ah, the follies of youth!)

Now, as chavs are wont to do, upon being refused, they made a huge fuss – lots of shouting and swearing. To be honest, I couldn’t tell if they were under 18 or not myself, due to their awful awful make-up.

I don’t quite understand this tendency to make a lot of fuss when you don’t get your way. Because not only will you not get the booze, you will not be allowed back into the shop. Even if you genuinely are over 18.

Now, like many if not most teenagers, I tried to buy booze when I was not legally supposed to. I came up with ways of going about this. Sometimes they were successful, and sometimes they failed. I say this purely for the purposes of reminiscence, you understand, and absolutely do not advise anyone to follow in my footsteps. Because that would be illegal.

1. Firstly, it was a question of choosing your venue carefully. I and my chums tended to aim for the small corner shop-type off licence rather than the big supermarket or chain offy. Your shop assistant in the big chain store has backup – a manager, possibly a security guard, people to give them support. Meanwhile, they also have someone watching over them if they do choose to serve you illegally, who can and will use them as a scapegoat if the polis come sniffing around. On the other hand, your small shop probably only has one guy who doesn’t give much of a damn.
2. Go in alone. Nothing looks more blatant than a big group of teenagers.
3. Choose your approach carefully. You must be confident. Dress respectably and not in an obviously teenage fashion. If there’s a group of you, send the oldest-looking one in. Act like you know exactly what you’re doing.
4. The actual choice of booze is significant. A four-pack of alcopops just screams “Dad’s picking me up later.” Beer is fine. Young people who can drink legally like beer. Don’t even fucking think about Lambrini.
   

   Not even as a joke.

5. Act like this is the most natural thing in the world when you approach the counter. You’ve done this a million times. Have the money ready. The aim is to get out as quickly as possible before your man behind the counter suspects that maybe you’re not the strutting man-about-town you pretend to be.
6. If you were lucky at this stage, he’d take the money, you could pick up the booze and you’d be away. The perfect crime!
7. If not, he’d ask for ID. At this point, the subterfuge has failed. The correct thing at this point is not to protest loudly and angrily, because technically the shoppie has you bang to rights. He can get into a lot of trouble if it turns out he’s been selling booze to minors. The correct thing to do is to act like, of course you have ID, you’d be worried if he didn’t ask, what with all the young delinquents about but – oh damn, you’re so used to not being asked that you’ve clean forgotten.
8. Act in a gentlemanly fashion. I don’t blame you, old sport, you’re only doing your job. Let me see if I’ve left it in the car, &c, &c. Turn on your heel and confidently stride out.
9. Try the offy on the next street, the guy there is like 90 and doesn’t speak English.

Charlotte Street Blues, we hardly knew ye

God damn, but this is sad news.

http://www.charlottestblues.com/

For those of you who didn’t click on that, Charlotte Street Blues in Fitzrovia has closed down. I mean, I just wish I’d got to know it better, you know? It was an awesome place for standing around, looking cool, listening to fine music, drinking fine beer.

Tempus fugit or something.

London Lit: Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky

Today I’d like to talk about a trilogy of linked novels. You may recall if you read this on a regular basis that I discussed Patrick Hamilton’s Hangover Square some months back. Well, this trilogy is another of his works, Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky. It comprises three linked novels, The Midnight Bell, The Siege of Pleasure and The Plains of Cement.

Hamilton is most at home when writing about losers – not necessarily contemptible or unpleasant characters, but characters whose lot in life is simply to lose.

There is something of an autobiographical element to his work because, for want of a better way of putting it, Hamilton was a bit of a loser himself. He was taken out of school at 15, having lived much of his childhood in poverty due to his father’s alcoholism. After a brief period as an actor, he broke into writing at the age of 19. Like his father, he struggled with alcohol (at one stage getting through three bottles of bootleg whisky a day), as well as chronic depression. He eventually died of cirrhosis of the liver.

The Midnight Bell, published in 1929, is very much in the author’s cynical and embittered voice. It’s set in the titular pub, located “off Euston Road” (presumably in Fitzrovia, going by geographical cues in the text) and centres on Bob, a handsome former sailor, now bar waiter. Now there’s a period detail for you – when was the last time you went to a backstreet boozer that had waiters? Sorry, I digress. Bob finds himself becoming obsessed over one of the customers, a young prostitute by the name of Jenny.

This being Patrick Hamilton, the course of true love never does run smoothly, or indeed, at all. It’s clear from the very start that Jenny has no intention of reciprocating. While Bob financially supports Jenny out of a kind of nobility, Hamilton spins it as a kind of selfish act – Bob is noble because it makes him feel good to be a white knight. Inevitably, things end badly for Bob. Jenny leaves him with nothing. This novel is based on Hamilton’s own life – he too had become infatuated with a prostitute, and it’s hard not to see his condemnation of Bob’s actions as self-loathing. If I’m honest, the problem I personally had with this novel was that it was a bit too similar to the later, but more polished, Hangover Square.

The Siege of Pleasure takes us out to the West London suburbs, and back in time a little. Jenny is the focus of this story – a young woman going into domestic service with high hopes for the future. I won’t tell you how it ends, but suffice it to say that she makes a lot of bad choices. Hamilton has little sympathy.

I have to admit that I delayed reading The Plains of Cement. It centres on the kindly but dull Ella, the barmaid in the background of The Midnight Bell. I couldn’t see this being particularly thrilling, but more fool me. This was, I have to say, the most enjoyable of the trilogy because the main character is so ordinary. There are no earth-changing events, no suicides, no murders, no torrid love affairs. Hamilton’s great strength is portraying the suffering of ordinary people in ordinary circumstances. Not to ennoble it or to dismiss it, but to show it as it is.

This trilogy is full of marvellously-observed characters and situations – the passive-aggressive Mr Eccles is the most stand-out character in this regard, but the pub is just full of ‘em. It’s not difficult to imagine Patrick Hamilton sitting in the bar of some equivalent of the Midnight Bell, overhearing some drunk and taking mental notes.

This is why I enjoy his work. He doesn’t attempt to judge his characters, either favourably or unfavourably, but simply to present them with all their qualities and flaws. Morality is hardly your concern when you read about these people because even the most peripheral character is so real that to moralise about them is to reduce them to two dimensions. The atmosphere, too, drips with authenticity – the Midnight Bell is a hopeless place in a grim West End a metaphorical thousand miles from the glamour of Piccadilly. Hamilton concentrates on three particular characters, but one suspects he could have built a novel around any of them. Check it out sometime, do.

Hobos: A User’s Guide

One point I have often lamented is the fact that I am seemingly always targeted in the street by anyone who wants anything – a petition signed, a subscription to the charity they’re really keen on as of this morning, a new convert to their religion or whatever. Having become fixated on this idea that I definitely want to do this thing, they will often become upset when I tell them that actually, I’m really not interested. Or, as I usually put it, “Sorry, I’m – (points vaguely forward as if to indicate something urgent and self-explanatory)“.

Now, one I find particularly difficult to deal with is your man the beggar. These take various forms, each one more awkward than the last. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate that not all beggars are faking it, but let’s just say there are a few who spoil it for the rest. The Big Issue is a pretty good read though, and I do occasionally pick that up (not by mugging the vendor, either, despite some scurrilous rumours ha ha ha!!!!!!1!).

We are told by the Metropolitan Police that it’s not really a good idea to give to individual beggars, as the money is often used to maintain addictions, to fund organised crime or both. Those who are enthusiasts of self-reliance say that genuine beggars become dependent on the generosity of others when they should be working to build a life for themselves. And the newspapers often howl about how beggars come to London and make millions of pounds a day and it’s disgusting. Sorry, being cynical about the media there, force of habit, but it is true that London is rich pickings for the beggar.

All that being said, here’s a field guide to the techniques beggars use (with me, anyway). You may wish to make a game of it.

And before you get all huffy and accuse me of being insensitive (which I am) or exploitative (which I am), there are some links to homeless charities at the bottom of the entry.

The Sob Story

This one often won’t portray themselves as a homeless person, but instead will claim to be a regular person just like you or me who has fallen on hard circumstances. There will be a long story with many exciting twists and turns which ultimately ends with a request for money. For some reason, a common opener is the phrase “Do you speak English?” Because in Central London, English speakers are evidently rare. The stories are never less than interesting – mugging is a common one, particularly if the beggar is female and doing a “damsel in distress” act. There was one chap who told me, twice in the same week, that he had a job interview in Potter’s Bar in two hours’ time. I told him he should stop applying for jobs in Potter’s Bar, and recognition dawned. A particularly memorable one was a fellow in Leicester Square who was on an epic quest to retrace his lost family.

I-Spy for 20 points.

The Interruption

This one will come up to you when you’re doing something else – chatting to friends in the pub, browsing a shop or whatever. A friend of mine, who is much more openly rude than I am, did not take to being interrupted mid-conversation and demanded to know what the beggar would do in exchange.

I-Spy for 10 points.

The parrot

This is mostly seen among those beggars for whom English is not a first language, or even a second or third. There will be a brief spiel learnt off by heart, often slightly mangled by constant repetition and the speaker’s unfamiliarity with what they’re actually saying. There’s a chap on Southampton Row in the morning whose spiel is the words “Have you 20p?” repeated as often as possible per minute. Always with the exact same intonation. “Have you twen-ty peeeee? Have you twen-ty peeeee? Have you twen-ty peeeee?” As he’s not technically requesting the 20p, I tend to say “yes” and walk on.

I-Spy for 5 points.

The Guilt Trip

This is a thankful rarity, but not unknown in the West End. This is when you’re on a date, and the beggar comes along in the hope of emotionally blackmailing you into giving money because, after all, you wouldn’t want to look like a skinflint in front of the lovely young lady, would you now? Fortunately, the people I date tend to be as flint-hearted as me, so it’s all cool.

I-Spy for 20 points.

But how did you get through the ticket barrier?

This is one exclusive to trains and the Underground. This beggar will come into the carriage and launch into a spiel about how they’re very sorry to interrupt our journeys and they know we’re very busy, but [sob story] and we could find it in our hearts to spare whatever we can they’d be really grateful. Standard procedure among passengers is to pretend that today’s Metro is so interesting that they are totally oblivious to the outside world.

I-Spy for 5 points.

That’s not a tune

Related to the above is the scourge that is the accordionist. Now, I’ve known some very good buskers on the trains, but the accordion, like the bagpipes, is one of those instruments where so many people think that merely by getting more than one sound out of the bastard, they are playing a tune. Correct procedure is to throw the accordionist out of a window. In the days of slam-door trains, you could just chuck them out of the door, which was much easier.

I-Spy for 10 points

The Improvised Busker

I must admit, these guys do tend to be good for a laugh. Basically, this is someone busking using anything found on the street as an instrument. A traffic cone, a bucket or whatever. Whether they get a tune out of it or not is immaterial, the point is they tried, damn you.

I-Spy for 5 points.

Pushing your luck

Sometimes, occasionally, when a beggar is particularly annoying and persistent about their 20p and I can’t get away, but there are too many people around for my favoured ritual slaughter, I do grudgingly reach into my pocket. Having got this, suddenly the amount requested will go up – from 20p to a pound or sometimes higher. At this point, you are within your rights to demand that the beggar get down on their knees.

I-Spy for 15 points

Not even trying

Some beggars just can’t be arsed at all. Whether it’s a total lack of sob story, a poor effort, a self-contradictory tale or just plain rudeness, the great thing about these beggars is that you will never feel guilty or doubtful about holding on to your change. I recall one who was quite openly swigging from a can of Tennants while he explained how he was saving up for a hostel. And one the other day hadn’t figured out that women who have been on the streets six months do not, as a rule, have immaculate makeup.

I-Spy for 15 points.

When you have collected 1000 points, send the book along with a postal order for 20p to the usual address to receive a can of Special Brew!

Conclusion

We’re all bastards, but in a way, isn’t society the biggest bastard of all? Think about it.

Further reading

http://www.shelter.org.uk/

http://www.crisis.org.uk/

http://www.bigissue.com/

Fly me to the Moon

George Orwell is, of course, best known for his political writings – Nineteen Eighty Four, Animal Farm, Down and Out in Paris and London and, of course, his Cerys Matthews biography, Homage to Catatonia. When he wasn’t busy being political, satirising the BBC or annoying T. S. Eliot, he was a man who enjoyed a good pint.

Unlike his contemporaries Dylan Thomas and Nina Hamnett, Orwell wasn’t an excessive drinker (although he was an excessive smoker, as alluded to by his essay Books vs. Cigarettes). He favoured the simple pint of beer, though never lager.

I have mentioned his once-favoured watering hole, the Fitzroy Tavern, in these pages a number of times before. However, this was not his perfect London pub. His perfect London pub was a little place called The Moon Under Water.

The Moon Under Water, despite what the photograph on the right may imply, was entirely fictional. It formed the title of a 1946 essay for the Evening Standard in which he set out his description of what he considered to be the perfect London pub.

He describes it as being two minutes from the bus stop and on a side street – this would more-or-less fit the Fitzroy, the Wheatsheaf and the dearly departed Beer House, Orwell’s three favourite hostelries. He says that despite this, the Moon is entirely free from drunks and rowdies, “even on a Saturday night.” Yr. Humble Chronicler does know of such a bar in Soho, but I’m afraid I’m keeping it to myself.

The Princess Louise

He says that the whole place should be “uncompromisingly Victorian,” but not in a fake way. I’m with him on this, partly because I hate the sleek, modern West End bars where the staff are very pretty but can’t pour a decent pint to save their lives (if you can even get a pint, that is). I know of several London pubs that are broadly Victorian in decor, including several in the West End. To my mind, the most uncompromisingly Victorian pub in London is the utterly beautiful Princess Louise in Holborn, which for many years boasted that it had last been redecorated in 1890. Then a few years ago they redecorated it again, but fortunately kept the old fixtures and fittings.

The clientele, Orwell suggested, should largely be regulars who are there for the conversation. This is interesting, as Orwell was not a naturally gregarious fellow, and often found it difficult to talk to people about anything other than politics.

The range of food he suggests should be readily available would not, I suspect, be found in any non-gastro-pub in London. Cheese, pickles, caraway seed biscuits and liver sausage sandwiches are unusual bar snacks today, and as for his suggestion of mussels, given that most pubs can’t even microwave properly, I certainly wouldn’t trust them with shellfish. A hearty lunch is a possibility, though rare due to the aforementioned dependence on the microwave (here, even the Fitzroy falls down).

Some of his criteria are simply unknown today – he considers the serving of beer in a handleless glass to be a “mistake.” Strawberry-pink china mugs, his favoured drinking vessel, are entirely alien to the modern drinker (though Orwell admits that even then they were a rarity in London).

He says that perhaps the most desirable quality of such a pub is that it should have a decent garden, although he admits that he knows of only three such pubs (none of which he names). I myself have encountered none in the City or West End. The King’s Head in Islington has a small garden, not accessible to the public, and the Dolphin in Hackney has a patio out back (at least, I think it does, I was drunk at the time). There are many more out in the suburbs.

Although Orwell’s pub was never real, the Wetherspoon’s chain of pubs was set up with his essay in mind – hence the large number of such pubs with the word “Moon” in the title, including several Moons-Under-Water. I suspect Wetherspoon’s was not what Orwell had in mind, given its straight glasses, young bar staff, lagers, fake-Victorian decor and heinous numbers of chavs. They did boast (possibly they still do, it’s a while since I’ve been in one) of having no music to allow conversation, as Orwell stipulated, but I suspect this was also to keep overheads down – no music, no royalties.

So, Orwell’s pub remains but a dream, and with pubs closing at an alarming rate, I suspect it will some day become entirely irrelevant. Which is a shame. I’d like a strawberry-pink china mug one of these days.

Further Reading

http://www.whitebeertravels.co.uk/orwell.html#moon - The full essay.

http://londonparticulars.wordpress.com/2009/08/09/puttin-on-the-fitz/ - In which the Fitzroy is discussed.

http://londonparticulars.wordpress.com/2009/08/16/a-bright-cold-day-in-april/ - George Orwell, the West End and Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Soho boho hobo

When you think of the Bohemian scene in London, a few obvious names spring to mind. Oscar Wilde. Augustus John. Dylan Thomas. But to my mind, no figure sums up the era of Bohemianism in London than Nina Hamnett.

Nina was many things – artist, writer, model and raconteur. But these days, she is probably best remembered not for work but for play. Christ but that was a clumsy sentence, better come up with something better before I click “publish”.

Nina is, these days, best remembered for her unconventional lifestyle and general ability to party hard. She first became known on the artistic circuit in Paris before becoming a regular in London at the Cafe Royal in Soho, a centre of Bohemianism from the 1890s onwards which closed down only in 2008. When that became too touristy, Nina and friends made the Fitzroy Tavern their new base from 1926 onwards.

Nina was known as the Queen of Bohemia, embodying fully the hard-drinking, hard-partying, bed-hopping lifestyle that scandalised the Daily Mail-reading public. The money she made from her art would disappear as quickly as it would arrive, and she would alternate between living the high life and living in conditions of abject poverty. She had a flat on Charlotte Street where she would often find herself dining on porridge or boiled bones.

In her time, she associated with some of the great names of the twentieth century – Pablo Picasso, Jean Cocteau, Augustus John, Dylan Thomas and George Orwell were all acquaintances at one time or another. She even fell afoul of the notorious Aleister Crowley, when in her book The Laughing Torso (named after a sculpture of her that is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum) accused him of being a black magician. Crowley sued for libel and lost catastrophically. Legend has it that he placed a curse on Hamnett thereafter.

The sad reality is that what became of Nina mirrors many other Bohemians through the decades. While she had been regarded as a great artistic and literary talent in the 1920s, by the mid-1930s the artistic world had caught up with her. She was no longer cutting-edge, but distinctly average. Sales of her work fell.

In part, this was down to alcohol. She found booze dominating her life more and more, and consequently she found it harder and harder to commit to her work. Her life became fragmentary, a series of short-term relationships and dashed-off works of art.

The poet and publisher Tambi (J. Meary Tambimuttu) had warned writer Julian Maclaren-Ross, “Only beware Fitzrovia. It’s a dangerous place, you must be careful… You might get Sohoitis, you know… if you get Sohoitis, you will stay there always day and night and get no work done ever. You have been warned.” He might have had Nina in mind when he said those words.

By the mid-1930s, Nina had begun to trade off her reputation more than her art, accepting money to give guided tours of the Boho haunts of Fitzrovia. Ironically, her presence became a tourist attraction in itself, the very pubs she and her circle had come to in order to avoid the crowds becoming intolerably crowded. The Wheatsheaf and the Bricklayers’ Arms, a short distance away, were the new favourites.

It’s sometimes suggested that the Second World War was what brought an end to the West End Bohemian scene, and others have suggested that it was the welfare state. Whichever one you blame, or even if you don’t blame either, it’s fair to say that things were different in the 1940s.

Nina was by this stage a figure in terminal decline. Her artistic career was dead and her behaviour was becoming even more erratic and occasionally violent. She would spend her time going from pub to pub, collecting donations in a tin towards the cost of another drink. In exchange, she would either tell anecdotes of the good old days or, when more befuddled, threaten to expose her breasts to those who didn’t pay up. When particularly smashed, she was in the habit of vomiting into her handbag and wetting the barstool (which I suppose is one way to make sure no one steals your seat).

In December 1956, in constant pain from a botched leg operation three years earlier, Nina was at a low ebb. She was deeply upset by a radio play, It’s Long Past Time, featuring a character named Cynthia who was clearly based on her. The play, in Nina’s opinion, depicted her as a pathetic, broken-down and washed-up figure. Worse, it had been written by a friend, Bob Pocock. A few days later, she from falling out of her window on to the railings below. There is some dispute as to whether this was suicide or an unfortunate accident – either seems possible.

A party was held in her honour some days later, appropriately enough, at the Fitzrovia.

Nina Hamnett was one of those larger-than-life figures who these days would probably find herself on the cover of the celebrity gossip magazines. Despite her sad decline – a fate all too common among the Bohemians – there’s no doubting that nobody reflected and contributed to the spirit of the West End between the wars quite like Nina.

I didn’t want to, she led me on

This is not a Scientology blog, so apologies to those of you hoping for some history-type stuff for yet another entry on the subject. I didn’t want to do it either. But I think you’ll agree that this one is justified.

At the end of the day’s work, I was feeling rather knackered. I needed to visit an art shop, and was looking to get home ASAP. My route into Fitzrovia took me down Tottenham Court Road where, as you may know, the Church of Scientology has a shop. Regular readers will recall that I was given a personality test there shortly before Christmas, and I’d singularly failed to be convinced into purchasing Dianetics, going on a course and cutting myself off from family and friends. I figured that was it, done, I’d looked into it and seen that it was shite.

Unfortunately, regular readers may also recall me lamenting the fact that I am quite a recognisable person. I was lost in thought as I passed the Scientology shop front and barely even noticed where I was until someone greeted me.  I turned.

Oh shit.

It was the woman who’d gone through my personality test with me – a young lady of diminutive stature with red hair. Unfortunately, having turned around, I couldn’t pretend not to have seen her. She asked me if I’d been online to check the Scientology website out. Ah, well, here was an out for sure. I explained that I had, but I’d also seen quite a lot of other stuff online… quite a lot of negative stuff. She replied that it was all lies. I said that, in fact, it seemed to me that just about every website not owned by the Church of Scientology was fiercely critical of the Church in one way or another. All lies. All? All.

She then asked if I’d been to the actual Scientology website. I said that I had, and it all seemed rather vague to me. She asked me to elaborate. I said that there was a lot of stuff about what Scientologists claim to do, but almost nothing about what they believe in. She said there was nothing – Scientology doesn’t have gods or anything like that. I said that that led me to a question I was rather hoping not to have to ask, namely the Xenu thing. She dismissed this as a lot of nonsense that someone made up.

I have noticed a little conjuring trick you can do with Scientologists. Ask them a couple of awkward questions and a second Scientologist will appear, as if by magic, and stand very casually a couple of feet away. Not particularly doing anything, just sort of staring into space. The Scientologist you’re talking to will occasionally throw a nervous glance at them. This might be because, according to the doctrine sent out by L. Ron Hubbard, anyone critical of Scientology is a “Suppressive Person,” and anyone in contact with them is a “Potential Trouble Source” that must be cleansed.

Anyway, yes, we both noticed the dark-haired guy in the long black coat, and I figured I should probably persist with the Xenu thing. I mentioned that I’d heard a recording of L. Ron Hubbard talking about the Xenu story on YouTube. It’s actually been posted several times, and here’s one copy.

This, my former examiner and now examinee told me, was fake. I said that it sounded an awful lot like Mr Hubbard, but was informed otherwise. So then I asked the big question. Namely, why, if the Xenu story is fake, does the book Dianetics have a picture of a volcano on the cover? To illustrate my point, I tapped the stack of Dianeticses on the table next to us. She gently led me a couple of steps over at this point, moving us actually away from the shop front – this will become significant. A blonde-haired young woman stuck her head out and looked at us curiously before withdrawing.

The Scientologist said that she had read all of L. Ron Hubbard’s writings, every single one, and seen nothing about Xenu whatsoever. I was tempted to point out that obviously she had not seen L. Ron’s screenplay Revolt in the Stars, the science fiction film dramatising the Xenu story that he tried to get made in the late ’70s to squeeze yet more money out of Scientology and which failed to take off due to the discovery of some highly questionable funding. But, well, I figured I was on a roll already. So then I asked the next Xenu-related question, namely that given the amount of ridicule the Church has received as a result of the Xenu story, and given that according to the Church it isn’t true, why have they not sued the likes of South Park for heinous libel? Why have legal actions regarding the story only been for copyright and trade secret violations? Why, for that matter, is a story the cult denies actually copyrighted by them? There was no response other than a repetition of the volcano being nothing to do with Xenu.

She asked me if there were any other questions. For Christ’s sake, woman, stay down! I asked her about the Oxford Capacity Analysis Test and why it was so called. She said it was because it was devised in Oxford. By the university, I asked? No. But it was definitely devised in Oxford. I said that attaching the name Oxford does rather suggest that they were trying to associate it with the university, and whether intentional or not, it’s highly misleading. I expressed my belief that it’s not possible to get a good score, and the reply was that, of course, my new-found friend had a perfect score. I also demanded to know what sort of peer reviews it had had, and was told to check the website.

Then I went on to mention that I had actually read Dianetics, having bought a second-hand copy from Oxfam (I’d rather make a donation to a charitable organisation that doesn’t spend £24 million on an empty City of London HQ, thanks). This was a half-truth, in that I’d got halfway through reading it. I mentioned one of the earlier claims by Hubbard, namely that Dianetics could cure defective vision. I said that I was very sceptical about this, as visual troubles are not “psychosomatic”. Well, luckily for sceptical me, my Scientologist friend had previously had astigmatism and now had perfect 20/20 vision, so she said.

Okay, being serious for the moment, how fucking dare the Church of Scientology try to exploit my sight problems to make me sign up to their half-arsed Mafia cult? And I’m just short-sighted. Makes you wonder how low they’d go. “Terminal cancer? Well, I had it, and after one auditing session I was cured! Give me your money!” Actually, there have been a number of deaths as a result of people renouncing conventional medicine in favour of Dianetics. Anti-psychotic drugs ain’t just Tic-Tacs, sweetheart.

Anyway, I said that astigmatism is a physical thing, often genetic. She rallied and said that yeah, but Dianetic auditing allowed her to conquer the thing that was preventing her getting better (the fact that astigmatism isn’t affected by the body’s healing process?) and now her vision was perfect. She said that she too had been sceptical, but if I would just experience auditing for myself, then I’d be astonished.

We have an old saying where I come from. Never enter an arse-kicking contest with a centipede.

So, my next question. How much would that cost? Because, I said, I had heard that Scientology was very expensive. She told me that if I bought the book-and-DVD set for the low, low morals price of £20, I’d get a FREE auditing session! Wow, I said. And what about the rest of the courses? I’d heard they cost a lot more. She said that there was no pressure whatsoever to go on any further courses, so really I had nothing to lose.

So I said that yeah, but I was reluctant to hand myself over like that, because I’d seen a lot of footage, both online and on TV, that suggests the Church is a little bit controlling. She said, “Which footage? Panorama?” witheringly. Yes, I replied (and so can you, in that link).

“And there was that bit where those two guys in a car are following them around, and the fact that they were filming the BBC as they were filming – that seemed odd to me -”

At this point, my new friend interrupted me and said that she had been here when they were filming, and they hadn’t even asked for an interview, so the whole thing was totally biased. Is there anything this woman hasn’t experienced? But I persisted. I asked her why the CoS had been filming the BBC, and in that bit when the guy lost it -

“Which guy?” she interrupted. Oh yes, I’d quite forgotten. While there’s a lot spoken about John Sweeney losing it in that documentary, he’s not the only one. Take a look at Tommy Davis, the cult’s loyal spokesdroid and spoilt brat extraordinaire.

There are a lot of clips on YouTube of Tommy losing his temper, suggesting to me that he’d make a better PR man if he just didn’t show up. Ever. I’d quite forgotten about all that, but thanks for reminding me, Scientology lady!

Anyway, I clarified that it was John Sweeney losing his temper, and said again that it’s a bit creepy that the CoS was filming him, it seems strange for an organisation that’s good and open to be so paranoid, and -

And at that point, ladies and gentlemen, I was subject to the worst get-out excuse I have ever witnessed in my entire life. I feel privileged in a way. My would-be saviour interrupted me and said, “Oh, there’s a phone call for me.”

We were standing outside. She wasn’t in front of the shop window, so she couldn’t have seen inside. I was closer to the door, so if the phone had gone, or someone had called for her, I would have heard – I pointed this out, but she dashed past me towards the door, and called to someone inside, “There’s a call for me, isn’t there?” Christ, I didn’t think anyone did that in real life. In the things-you-can-say-that-give-away-the-fact-that-you’re-lying charts, the only way she could have been more blatant would have been if she’d said, “There’s a call for me. Yeah, that’s it, a call.”

As she disappeared in, she told me that I should go to the main centre in Blackfriars, and they’d be able to answer my questions. This is unlikely, as the last time we’d spoken, she’d told me that both centres were staffed by the same people. Weeeell, etiquette demands that I take the invitation up. I mean, what are they going to do – kill me? Good luck, they believe in reincarnation.

Further reading

http://londonparticulars.wordpress.com/2010/02/21/what-a-cult/ - This was the Scientology-related post I put up less than two weeks ago.

An Open Letter to the Church of Scientology

Church of Scientology, Blackfriars

Dear The Church of Scientology,

How are you today? I am fine myself. The reason I am writing is that, on Tuesday, I was handed a leaflet by one of your people in the Tottenham Court Road. My curiosity piqued, on Saturday I looked in at your main HQ in Blackfriars. I’m afraid that, despite trying to be as open-minded as possible, I wasn’t convinced. If you’ll indulge me, I’ll explain why.

You see, The Church of Scientology, when it comes to criticism, you come across a little bit like a bad writer when the reviews come in. Do you know what I mean? Rather than actually address the criticism, you tend to either attack the critic or claim “religious persecution.” While you may think this is acceptable, to everyone outside your organisation it looks somewhat paranoid. The fact that you’re so ready to respond to criticism but not to address it directly does raise the suspicion that there may be some truth in it. As has been pointed out in the comments below, this doesn’t necessarily mean that there is truth in these arguments, but one cannot help wondering.

So, before I go any further, let me say that I am not going to persecute you for your religious beliefs. This, in part, is because you’re quite cagey and conflicting in your accounts of what they actually are. What I am going to do is point out where you are going wrong. So, without further ado, here are my suggestions.

1. Stop playing the religious persecution card.

Religious persecution is an attack on a person or a group of people specifically for their religious beliefs. If I say that the persecution of Catholics during the Tudor era was a Bad Thing, that is not an attack on Protestantism or Christianity as a whole, but a criticism of the government that pursued a policy of persecution. If I attack Fred Phelps, that is not an attack on Christianity, but an attack on a horrible man whose beliefs and actions do not accord with those of most Christians. If I point out that the Bible has self-contradictory points, that is not religious persecution. It’s religious questioning, and in my experience most religious officials are happy to address it.

Unfortunately, The Church of Scientology, you do not seem to understand this. When someone questions your beliefs, your church or your founders, you shout that it’s “religious persecution” even when it clearly isn’t. Now, to be fair, it might be argued that some anti-Scientology groups do attack your beliefs themselves – we’ve all seen that South Park episode, I’m sure, and it wasn’t exactly even-handed. But such attacks are normally based around concepts like Xenu, which you claim not to believe in anyway.

2. Stop “attacking the attacker.”

While you deny that a policy of “attacking the attacker” exists, the fact is that when you’re criticised, you have a tendency to badmouth the critic. This is a very poor debating technique, even creationists know that. If someone is untrustworthy, point out the faults with their argument. Blow away the sand their castle is built upon. If you choose to strike at the person making the complaint, as I said above, it looks like they might be right.

3. Chill, Winston.

If I may quote from my own upcoming self-help work, Awesometastics, “If you can’t laugh at yourself, someone else will do it for you.” The problem, The Church of Scientology, is that you don’t seem to have a sense of humour. The only time the average person sees a scientologist laughing is either at the expense of someone who has criticised the church or while gushing about how great Scientology is. This makes you look, if I may dip into the vernacular, kind of like dicks. Mean-spirited. Having a sense of humour at your own expense is not a sign of weakness – I’d say it’s exactly the opposite. It shows that you’re secure in yourselves.

But more to the point, many of your detractors do use humour. That South Park episode was pretty funny, and so are some of the articles about you on Encyclopedia Dramatica. Why not take them on at their own game? Come on, you must have some comedy writers among your number, give them a shot. If you can get people laughing with you, not at you, you’ll win!

Along those lines, you need to be less uptight about what people say. Again, it makes you look bad when you overreact. Just ignore them, they’ll get bored and go away. Don’t – I repeat – do not throw lawsuits around like confetti. That looks even worse. That makes you look like a big bully who likes squashing the little guy. Have you heard of a case known as the McLibel trial? That, briefly, was a case in which two activists handed out some leaflets levelling accusations at McDonalds, who sued for libel and won. But it was a Pyrrhic victory, because McDonalds was forced to admit that while the allegations against them were not true, they weren’t entirely pure as the driven snow. Plus they looked like litigious jerks. Not that I’m saying you have skeletons in the closet, but you know, just be careful is all. Sometimes you just have to let it go.

4. Stop using Tom Cruise.

Tom Cruise is a crazy sandwich with a side of pickled wrong. Stop using him as your celebrity figurehead. Everyone’s thinking “Scientology = nutjob” when they see him. There must be loads of celebrities you could use instead. I mean, don’t you have the guys from My Name is Earl? They’re great! You could do a skit with them. Something along the lines of, I don’t know, “How’s the list going, Earl?” “Well, Randy, Karma’s pretty good, but now I’ve discovered Dianetics!” Something like that. I don’t know, I’m not a professional writer.

5. Understand the Internet.

Your understanding of the online world seems a little shaky. I’ve noticed this in your dealings with the group known as “Anonymous.” You only seem able to deal with them if you think of them as a conventional organisation. I’ve seen your Religious Freedom Watch website, you seem to feel that you have to paint them as some sort of grand conspiracy rather than a bunch of people with a common interest and Internet access. As if you can take the leader out and the rest will follow. It doesn’t work like that.

On the subject of your Religious Freedom Watch website, it really is very obvious that you own that. I mean, one look at the forums will show that the only religion that people are interested in defending on there is, in fact, yours. And the fact that there are only threads denouncing those who attack Scientology, with every post written in the same style, shows that you need to spend more time lurking on actual forums. Where are the misspellings? The inexplicable usernames? The funny signatures? The threads devoted to useless crap? It’s a blatant deception, The Church of Scientology. I’m not so much angry with you as… disappointed. I just think you’d look better if you either didn’t lie so obviously or, better still, didn’t lie at all. While we’re on the subject…

6. If you don’t want people to think you’re a cult, stop acting like one.

You deny the allegations of child abuse. You deny that L. Ron Hubbard demanded that people who turned against the church be killed using “Auditing Method R2-45,” i.e. shooting them with a handgun, claiming that this was a joke (and might I say that I don’t think that’s in very good taste). You deny that you pursue the policy that anyone who criticises you is “fair game.” You deny that you’re a cult. The thing is, The Church of Scientology, it can’t be denied that you do some pretty sinister things. I saw that Panorama documentary (you know, the one where John Sweeney lost his temper), and you were very blatantly sending people to follow him around in cars. What was the deal there?

And there was “Operation Snow White” in which you were caught performing illegal activities, which for reasons of space I will not go into here. And “Operation Freakout.” And that business with Noah Lottick. And Lisa McPherson. And the National Association for Mental Health in Britain. In these cases and others like them, you tend to deny any wrongdoing but – here’s the fly in the ointment – you also tend to act in a shifty, evasive and unhelpful fashion. It looks like you have something to hide. I am trying to be nice to you here, The Church of Scientology, but you really are not helping yourselves.

This is particularly relevant when you claim religious persecution, as I suggested above that you should not. But if you absolutely must claim religious persecution, it really doesn’t help your case if you’re going around acting like a less professional version of the Men in Black.

7. The UK does exist.

This is more of a nitpick than anything else, but when I visited your Church, the videos you had showing were in American English. The facts and figures they quoted referred to the USA, not Britain. It’s not as if you couldn’t afford to put new videos together for the British market. It just seems a little disrespectful to me. Not to mention the fact that I find myself thinking, “Well, maybe psychiatry did kill more people than the Spanish-American War, but I know nothing about the Spanish-American War.”

8. I want an apology for Battlefield Earth.

L. Ron Hubbard, in pretty well every non-Scientology source, comes across as a deeply unpleasant man. Racist, homophobic, egotistical, lying, fraudulent, bullying and generally something like the Used Car Salesman From Hell. Come on, Battlefield Earth featured a race of kimono-wearing, kowtowing aliens known as the “Chinkos.” Makes Jar-Jar Binks look like… something that isn’t a racist alien caricature.

Now look, I appreciate that by attacking Hubbard, I myself am indulging in an ad-hominem argument. But I really fucking hated that film, and an apology from yourselves would go a long way to rectifying that.

Conclusion

Now, I don’t know how you’ll take this. You may ignore it. You may attack it. You may laugh at it on one of your websites, possibly with a series of eerily similarly-worded replies. You may even start investigating me for past crimes (you could probably get me on fare dodging, forging signatures and trespassing if that helps) and start publicly laying into me. I suspect you won’t. I suspect you won’t even see this. But if you do, don’t dismiss it. Seriously. I’m trying to help you out here, many wouldn’t. Just think about it, okay?