PC 161 The Atlantic – a Tall Ships’ Race

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Way back in 1975, on a cool autumnal evening in Dempsey Barracks, Sennelager in Germany, I was sitting in my room in the Officers Mess of 39 Medium Regiment Royal Artillery, thinking how the last training exercise had gone. The mess orderly knocked; I had a telephone call, someone called Major Mike May. Hard to believe these days, when communication devices are personal and in your face, or should that be at your ear (?), but the Mess’ telephone was housed in a little cubicle off the main ground floor corridor. Outgoing calls were made via an exchange operator! It was a somewhat airless and dimly lit space, but doubtless privy to countless intimate conversations over the decades. I had sailed with Mike May a few times and this was really our only connection; so I was expecting some sailing-related question, but not: “Would you like to navigate an Army entry in the STA Race next year?”

The STA (Sail Training Association) was an umbrella organisation for offshore sailing in the UK, but more importantly organised an annual international race for square riggers and sailing ships. (See note 1) I had taken part in its 1969 race from Portsmouth to Skagen in Denmark, so was familiar with its ethos of encouraging youngsters to develop their character through sailing. Additionally in 1974 I had had a fortnight sailing as a Watch Officer on the TS Malcolm Miller, a three-masted schooner. The 1976 race was from Portsmouth, England to Newport, Rhode Island, USA via Tenerife, in The Canaries, and Bermuda. These four legs would be sailed by different crews; we were allotted the Tenerife to Bermuda leg, a distance of just under 3000 nautical miles. Bermuda, an island lying some 600 miles east of the USA state of North Carolina, is 22 miles long but only one mile wide!

After some crew training in The Baltic we, Mike May as Skipper, me as Navigator and ten other army personnel, flew to Santa Cruz de Tenerife on 21st May 1976 and took over the Nicholson 55ft yacht HMY Sabre.

Two days later the race to Bermuda started; there must have been about 50 vessels, from huge ‘tall ships’ to lesser mortals like us. Offshore racing is strange; you have a crowded, manic surge across the start line, the skippers set their course and off you go. Most modern yachts can sail just below 40 deg to the wind, the tall ships probably only manage 60 deg; but their speed was much superior to ours, so their passage quite different! I don’t think we saw any other competitors after that first night, such is the vastness of our oceans! It’s a long time ago (!) but I think we organised a watch system of 4 hours on/4 hours off with a ‘dog watch’ to change the routine …… for three weeks.

So ….. days of watch and sail changing, attempting to squeeze another knot out of the yacht and our inexorable progress towards Bermuda. Ripped sails needed mending, gear needed maintaining, bread needed making – or should that be kneading? And with twelve people in a small confined space, the crew needed managing!

The trade winds are the prevailing pattern of winds found in the tropics, from the east towards the west. Tenerife is some five degrees north of the Tropic of Cancer so we were able to take advantage of these favourable winds, flying the large spinnaker sail almost for two weeks, before a final few days of head winds and heavy seas. Somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic we were becalmed and this gave us all an opportunity to have a swim, although prudence ensured only one crewman was in the sea at any time, the rest maintaining a lookout for sharks!

…….. and me! (Not thinking how deep the water was!)

Fresh water was rationed to 1.5 litres per person per day – although we had an extra splash in a whisky at drinks time. The eventual lack of fresh food and the constant exposure to salt water produced some skin issues but otherwise the planned menus worked well.  Sometimes the nights seemed very long …….

…… and at other times the conditions required much concentration …….

We checked in with the Race Controllers every day by two-way radio, giving our position and listening to those of the yachts we saw as our competitors! Into our final week and we had head winds which gave us more movement and surprisingly some seasickness!

No two yachts were the same and there was a handicap system. We navigated by sextant with sun and moon shots, converting our data by way of navigational tables and a Hewlett-Packard calculator the size of a house brick that had some computing ability, to a position on the chart ……. and were very pleased to find the tiny island of Bermuda right on the bow on the 10th June.

We had arrived in Bermuda at the beginning of the hurricane season, greeted by cloudy and extremely humid weather. The Tall Ships gradually filled up the harbours and small bays and celebrations were numerous and colourful; thousands of young people enjoying a tremendous achievement, crossing one of the great oceans of the world. And if you’ve never tried Planter’s Punch, do so, but do it in the environment for which it was created; doing so back in Germany some weeks later it wasn’t quite the same! But we had done well and somehow managed to win some trophy.

Richard 19th September 2019

PS I even managed to catch up with an ex-school friend who lived there.

Note 1. Founded in 1956, the Sail Training Association (STA) became the Tall Ships Youth Trust. The current Tall Ships’ Races are organised by the Portsmouth-based Sail Training International.

PC 108 I’m Long and Black

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“Oh! If I could only talk I could tell you a thing or two …….  but if it helps I’m almost 50 years old; not that it matters as I don’t measure my existence by years but by my capacity to deliver what I was made to do. OK So I’ve got your attention, that’s good as normally I am just left in a cupboard hung up, feeling abandoned ……. until the next time. Currently I’m in the cupboard with the hot water tank, a lazy maid and some Samsonite luggage as there’s no garage or attic where we live. It’s warm when the water’s hot and quite dry, so I can’t complain.

My first memory I think comes from 1969, when my owner needed something like me; it’s a good feeling to be wanted. He had a large room in the Officers’ Mess Annexe of the Artillery Barracks in the German town of Lippstadt, on the edge of the Paderborner Plain.

The barracks had housed a Luftwaffe battalion and the Mess itself was beautiful, but single officers’ accommodation was limited, hence the annexe within the main barracks. Sadly there were few electrical sockets and he saw a need for an extension cable of some sort. Ah! You’ve guessed it, I’m an electrical cable; three wires, green, red and blue (See Note) sheathed in a black outer casing. I used to be part of an enormous reel of cable that the army used for all sorts of things. Then one Saturday my owner soft-soaped the soldier in charge of the stores to cut some off; it was about 15 yards long (we didn’t ‘do’ metres in those days.) At one end he fitted a square pin extension block and at the other a German two pin plug. The smart record player, the radio and a couple of lights were all plugged in. Oh! And I am ¼ inch in diameter.

You might be surprised to read that I gave birth once! My owner needed about six feet of flex. He never told me why, just got a pair of pliers and cut it off! Didn’t hurt as I am inanimate but I healed up quite well, particular when the plug was refitted. By then we were back in England so my two end connections didn’t change. At one end I have a rubber coated square three pin plug, at the other a rubber coated socket. Both have become pretty grubby over the years but it’s been a long haul!

It’s hard to imagine today but outside lights at Christmas were a real novelty back in the 1980s …… and the best ones came from Germany ….. so a visit to a Christmas market in Hanover secured a large string that was rewired with a UK square plug and that was plugged into me. In those days he didn’t have an outside socket and he relied on me, you see. But it was suffocating, being wrapped up in lots of plastic bags and duct tape to keep any rain out. Oh! The ignominy of it!

Wanda the bronze angel fish doing her thing, provided with power by me! (circa 2001)

I was also used to provide power to the pump that fed water up into Wanda; it came out of her mouth!! But when the outside socket was fitted, my job was done, and I went back to hanging around, for some time at the top of some cellar steps.

Occasionally I would have a car vacuum cleaner plugged in but the suction was never strong enough and invariably the domestic vacuum cleaner was used. Don’t ever do this on a driveway which has been surfaced with gravel. I have always thought of myself as a sort of DIY (Do It Yourself) extension cable; no pretences, me. But I remember he once was in B&Q (a DIY Store) and saw an extension cable in a proper reel, red I think it was. I could sense he coveted it, looking all neat and new, but he is loyal to me and walked away, shaking his head and muttering.

I am grateful for his love of sailing, you know. If he hadn’t learned about how to handle ropes (on board a yacht a rope is actually called anything but a rope – for example warps, sheets, halyards, guys etc,) I would not be in as good a shape as I am now. On board a sailing yacht a tangled rope is a disaster waiting to happen, so there was constant vigilance to ensure all ropes were tidy and coiled It’s best to coil the rope/cable into the left hand, as that movement of the wrist takes out any twists in the rope. Wire cables such as me are no different.

In my twilight years I am generally used to connect to a jig saw, a sander or a garden strimmer, as his drill is now a Dewalt cordless one. You might think this is progress but he uses it so little the battery is invariably dead and needs a charge!! Maybe he rues the day he got rid of the one that needed me; who knows?  I won’t mention the fact that he uses the garden table as his workbench and that it occasionally gets nicked, sawn and drilled into (so don’t tell anyone). I cringe when it happens but what can I do?

And my friend Wanda? Well, she’s come inside …… and seems content to look wistfully down the road to the sea …… some 150m away.”

Sometimes one gets an idea and just needs to scribble …… inane really!

Richard 21st October 2017

Note: these days it would be yellow/green, brown and blue

Old (ie me!) on the left, new on the right

PC 106 Sailing in The Baltic

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In the aftermath of the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945 the spoils of war were, no doubt, extraordinary and various. One of them was a collection of yachts based in the Baltic city of Kiel, the centre for Hitler’s enormous U Boat fleet. The base itself had suffered extensive bombing and its huge concrete submarine pens lay crumpled and blasted, but the British Army established a sailing club on the western side of Kieler fjord, where these windfall yachts were moored.

Wind the clock forward to 1969 and the British Kiel Yacht Club still had a small number of these ‘windfall yachts’ as they were known; some 30 sq ms, a couple of 50 sq ms and one 100 sq m classic wooden yacht called Kranich, built in 1936. (For explanation of sq m ‘square metre’ see note). In addition they had a fleet of modern GRP ones that were used to teach the rudiments of sailing to British Army personnel; these were without engines!

I hadn’t sailed much as a child, one simple sailing holiday with my father when I was 10, but in 1968 sailed around The Solent a bit in a little 19ft yacht called Barbican …… and on a very wet yacht in Cyprus …..  and rather liked it. You might say I took to sailing like a, er, duck to water? So when my Regiment was posted to northern Germany, the obvious place to indulge the interest was in The Baltic. To refresh your knowledge of geography, The Baltic is the name of the shallow sea that is almost enclosed by European countries – Sweden, Finland, The Baltic States, Poland and Germany, and flows out through the low lying islands of Denmark, through the Kattegat and into the North Sea. It’s got a low saline content due to its mix of salt water inflowing from the North Sea and outflowing fresh water draining from a land mass four times larger than the sea itself.

Two shipping channels run between the large islands of Funen and Zealand and between Zealand and the western coast of Sweden. Otherwise the Danish waters are quite shallow, making for short sharp seas when it’s windy and always interesting navigation. Channels are marked by upturned broom sticks; some had one bundle of sticks lashed to the pole, others two and sometimes three. So typically Danish!!

Before going off to university, I was in Germany for 9 months in 1969, and took part in Kieler Woche, the country’s equivalent of Cowes Week, the sailing festival on the Isle of Wight in UK. I sailed on a long keeled yacht called Uomie, named as it was taken in payment of a debt!! We did well during the week and particularly coming first in our class in the Fehmarn Light Race. The skipper gave each of the five crew members a little silver schnapps cup.

After university I rejoined my Germany-based regiment ….. and naturally went back to sailing in the Baltic. The first time was actually racing from Cowes on the Isle of Wight to Skagen, right on the tip of Denmark. Skagen is an artists’ favourite, as the quality of the light is amazing. We then passaged south to Malmö in Sweden for a regatta. Teaching soldiers the benefits of teamwork through using the forces of nature, ‘adventurous training’ as it was euphemistically called, was considered a good thing!! The attraction was obvious; hundreds of little islands, narrow channels threading their way between them, charming villages and towns with enchanting names like Aerøskøbing, Middlefart, Juelsminde, Kerteminde, Lohals and Faaborg.

In my 5 years in Germany I must have developed a reputation for often being away from barracks sailing. Once, during a leadership course for junior NCOs, the Regimental second-in-command, Major John Harman, was explaining some aspects of the vital cooperation needed between the artillery and infantry. I won’t bore you with the details but at some point he asked, by way of confirmation that they had understood: “And where would you expect to find Golf 31 (my radio callsign) Captain Yates during this particular phase of the battle?” A wag at the back of the classroom shouted: ‘Sailing in the Baltic sir!’

In my room in the Officers’ Mess, I hung up on a wall four Danish maps sellotaped together so I could plot the course of each trip; after a couple of years it looked as though a drunken spider had walked into some red paint and then all over the map! Apart from trips up the Als Sund north from Sønderberg, drifting in and out of islands around Lohals on Langeland, and finding enough crabs for supper in a rotten rowing boat just alongside where we had tied up in Aerøskøbing, one major trip involved sailing St Barbara II, a 42ft Rebel, up to the Norwegian capital Oslo, when the engine had been taken out for its annual overhaul. This meant that we had to charge the battery, needed for navigational lights if nothing else, every time we went into a harbour. Going into a crowded marina without an engine was a tricky and anxious time and occasionally we gratefully took a proffered tow.

The Oslo crew on St Barbara II

On one trip sailing a ‘windfall’ yacht, we had just tied up alongside the village quay in Juelsminde and were getting down to the serious business of having a drink. People get attracted to yachts and boats in harbours as the poles of magnets to each other and we often had rubberneckers peering down on us. One particular old chap came wandering down the harbour wall and stopped; “Guten abend. Wie Gehts?” he greeted us. Then he proceeded to switch to Pidgin English. “Zis iz a lovely yacht, ja! Sehr schön. You took zem from us after ze war ja?” and with that, shaking his head as to what might have been, he shuffled off back into the village.

Generally the islands between the mainland of Denmark, Jutland, and the island of Zealand, on which Copenhagen is situated, provided ample enough cruising grounds, but one year I actually sailed into Langeline Harbour in Copenhagen, before continuing south through the Stege Bugt to Stubbekøbing. In Denmark’s capital city, down in the harbour, lies the delightful statue of ‘The Little Mermaid’, sitting on her rock since 1913. Her head is of the ballerina Ellen Price, but as she didn’t want to pose naked the sculptor persuaded his wife Eline Eriksen to pose for him.

The memories of sailing in these delightful waters will stay with me forever; although I have few still photographs, I have many hours of Super 8 Cinefilm, transposed to VHS Video and then to CDs as technology made one means obsolete! And so will the Danish sense of humour. Did you know that a ferry service runs between the Swedish city of Gothenburg and the Danish town of Frederikshavn on Jutland? Well, there is one and it’s rumoured that the skipper doesn’t need a chart, he simply follows the line of empty green Carlsberg bottles thrown over the side by Swedish passengers pleased to get away from the ruinously expensive alcohol of their home country!

Richard September 2017

Note: The Skagen School of artists exists because of the quality of the daylight on this very tip of Denmark

Note: For those technically minded, these ‘square metre’ yachts are measured by a difficult formula. R Metres = (L + 2d + √s – F) ÷ 2.37 where L is the waterline length, d the difference between skin and chain girth (?), s the sail area and F the freeboard

PC 15 Alcohol and Other Drugs

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The afternoon drinkers on George Street here in Hove are a rum lot, a glorious mix of ages and gender, most seemingly down on their luck, others lost in their personal reverie. Makes me sieve the memories of my own life and my relationship with alcohol and other drugs ….. although I am certainly not ‘down on my luck’ and probably never have been!

At one point in my teenage days, I vowed not to drink ….. but that didn’t last long. After ‘prep’ at boarding school one evening, we went off on bikes to The Owl, probably the smallest, grottiest village pub imaginable. I should add here that ‘pubs’ were out of bounds! My chums suggested a half pint of the basic draught beer, probably Wadsworths from the local brewery. I remember lifting it to my lips; bitter, watery, my face wrinkles even now at the thought of it. Somehow I drank it, not relishing the taste. And then I was persuaded to have another! Didn’t take much for my vow to lie shattered on the straw-strewn floor. Besides, alcohol plays a huge part of the fabric of our Western society, a lubricant for work, love and play, so why not just do what’s expected?

And everyone smoked!! Silk Cut, Passing Cloud, Gauloises, B&H, Dunhill, Marlborough; you name it, I probably smoked it! My grandparents lived in Bath and on a day off school I would take the bus to see them. My grandfather smoked unfiltered cigarettes and the ash would drop onto his waistcoat; the butts went into the wastepaper basket and then Granny, before retiring for the night, poured in some water to ensure there were no live embers!!! Once, on my way back to school on the Sunday evening, I got off the bus in Devizes to stretch my legs, with a cigarette in my mouth. Down the steps, straight into one of the school prefects! Oops! That earned me 6 strokes of the cane and much street cred! We got rather blasé about it as we got more senior. Ray and I would have a cigarette after breakfast ……. and then go off to the Applied Maths lesson; it took Mr Hiscock the teacher to remind us that cigarette smoke sticks to both breath and clothing!

At home as a family, my parents, brother and I would watch Saturday night television – smoking; on some occasions you could hardly see the screen through all the smoke! And to think it was permissible to smoke on the London Underground, on aeroplanes and in the cinema; I think we’ve moved in the right direction here, banning it from all public places! You remember that wonderful Nina Simone song “Don’t smoke in bed!”? Well, I think I used to start and finish the day with a cigarette; such is the addiction, the craving for nicotine. There were long periods in my life when I didn’t smoke and long periods when I did, but I had my last cigarette in 1994, well on Tuesday 21st April at 9pm if you were wondering! Do I miss it? Sometimes, if I’m honest, yet smelling second-hand smoke is …. revolting!

Attitudes to alcohol and other drugs in the British Army simply reflected what was going on in civilian life, although thankfully the use of drugs other than nicotine, soft or hard, was rare. We smoked and we drank, both often to excess. My step-father gave me a silver cigarette case when I graduated from The Royal Military Academy; I still have it ……. and his father’s pewter hip flask circa 1890. I was posted to Germany, to a small town called Lippstadt, to help deter the Russians, for the Cold War was at its height. The hip flask came into its own filled with ‘ferrets’, a 50/50 mix of brandy and cherry brandy, on the bare-arsed live-firing ranges of Bergen-Hohne when the temperature dropped to minus 10 deg C.

We drank at lunchtime and in the evening. We ate in dinner jackets once a week and had formal ‘dinner nights’ once a month; we drank, often to excess! In the old Luftwaffe Officers Mess where we single officers lived, there was an interesting addition to the fittings in the ‘Gentlemen’s’. Made of good quality porcelain were two objects which looked like urinals, but were in fact receptacles for …… vomit! Yes! Truly; complete with long vertical side bars, brass and polished daily, to grip on to. Can you imagine? Even today I think how simply awful …… but so practical if alcohol had got the better of you! By the way, I don’t want to give the impression that we were always pissed! When we were out of barracks training, often for weeks on end, we were dry! We simply worked hard and played hard!

When I first started giving blood, the National Blood Transfusion service offered tea & biscuits afterwards; and still does I guess. But men were also asked whether they would like a bottle of Guinness, on the basis that this famous Irish stout would replace some of the iron that was contained in your donated pint of blood. Seemed madness to say ‘no’! So The State encouraged you to drink!

Not a great fan of beer, I developed a taste for wine, which when I was growing up was still a bit of a celebratory drink. The white wines were dominated by Liebfraumilch and Black Tower, cheap German imports – about the only good thing about them, in my opinion, was the name! I loved red wine, the gutsier the better. In my youth it was generally French although you could get decent German reds if you happened to be in that country. Gradually wine from the Antipodes made its way to England and Shiraz and Grenache became a favourite tipple. It was fine to drink as the advice at the time was “Red wine is good for you!”

Sailing and drinking seemed to go together too. There was one occasion when my hired yacht was tied up alongside a German one in the port of Sønderborg in Denmark; the crew had gone ashore – probably for a drink! The skipper of the German one asked whether I wanted to join him for a gin; my mind immediately imagined good gin, lovely tonic, a slice of lemon and lots of ice. Below decks he opened a bottle of Gordon’s, and poured a generous amount into a glass …… and that was it; after a while neat gin isn’t that bad, but it does give you a headache!

I won’t recount how we felt the following morning after a few of us tried every drink on the bar list of the local teachers’ mess; or tell you at what time I had a first beer at the start of a yacht race in The Baltic. I will however offer my rather untutored observation after a Wine/Food Tasting event ……. that dessert wine will go with any type of food and I’ll advise you against drinking too much Pimms, with little lemonade and in strong sunshine.

Twelve years ago, I completed an ordinary detox of food and drink for the month of January; you know the sort of thing, no red meat, chicken, coffee, alcohol, wheat etc. Being quite an obsessive character, for me it’s often all or nothing. I couldn’t, for instance, just have one cigarette a day or a week, as some people can; it’s nothing or 20. I recognised that this was almost the case with alcohol. Was there a day in the week when I didn’t have a glass of wine with supper? Or could I not really remember??!!  Ha! Ha! So whilst I happily went back to drinking coffee and eating red meat, I sort of delayed drinking alcohol again. And that’s where I am today, looking for good non-alcoholic beers, and there are some, and coping in a society where it’s normal to drink. “Still not drinking then?” the husband of a friend asks. “No!” “Oh! Go on, just one won’t hurt!” For some drinkers it’s impossible to see that you can survive without alcohol, for it makes us more relaxed, less inhibited, so surely you would, wouldn’t you?

There was a discussion on the radio about alcohol some time ago and someone suggested that 99.9% of all human relationships in our Western culture generally started over a bottle of wine or a pint of beer. Celina and I had our first supper almost three years ago; she had some wine, I had some water. Someone said one drinks alcohol to make other people more interesting!! If this is the case, I leave you to draw your own conclusions!



Richard Yates  June 2014                                     richardyates24@gmail.com

PC 131 Sipping Ginger Tea

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Sipping ginger tea and eating a large succulent red grape –  my body radiates warmth, at least that is what it feels like, in that afterglow of a massage. I’m on the third floor of the Banyan Tree Spa complex in Estoril, Portugal – a collection of pools, spas, saunas, a gym, treatment rooms and an indoor/outdoor café. The Spa Pool has water jets and a large circular section where the water rotates at about 2 mph. Swim against the current or simply let it lift you and take you – around and around!! Just the place for a wet Friday afternoon.

Massage has a funny reputation, a sort of nudge-nudge, wink-wink, amongst the male species and that reputation is not helped by some dubious massage parlours being used as a front for prostitution. You will have seen the different types of proper massages being advertised – Swedish, Aromatherapy, Hot Stone, Chair, Deep Tissue, Trigger Point, Shiatsu and Thai – and unless you regularly have them in conjunction with keeping fit or for some medical relief, it’s likely you only have one or two a year, on holiday maybe? I once heard a masseur saying that one a year is a complete waste of time – but hey that ‘afterglow’ is something, so why not have more?

Celina gave me a gift of a 90 minutes Thai massage: “Apparently it’s really fantastic!” I love massages, so readily said: ‘Yes please’. I prefer being massaged by someone of the opposite sex as that introduces an imaginary world that excites and disappoints in equal measure. I once had a massage by a chap who was blind; with his enhanced sense of touch and space it was unique, but it missed that frisson that develops, in my mind if nowhere else, between a male and female.

One website says: “Thai massage is a unique blend of assisted yoga, passive stretching, and pressing massage movements. Thai massage is more energizing than other forms of massage: it’s a little bit like yoga without doing the work, as the therapist moves and stretches you in a sequence of postures, usually on a mat on the floor. Like shiatsu, Thai massage aligns the energies of the body. The massage therapist uses rhythmic compression along the body’s energy lines to reduce stress and improve flexibility and one’s range of motion. It is done fully clothed. This type of massage can reduce muscle spasticity and back pain and has been shown to be useful in treating balance problems and migraine symptoms.”

So at 1720 I check in with Deborah at the Reception Desk, go and change into those obligatory white towelling bath robes, and report back. A Thai woman appears; it’s not until later I ask her name – Nicole – and there’s probably a Thai name by which she’s known at home, but here she’s trying to westernise herself. I think about asking but realise that pronouncing a Thai name might stretch my linguistic ability.

“OK. Go in there and take your clothes off. Here’s a sarong to wrap around yourself” – so much for the ‘fully clothed’! Obviously what follows is about my own experience, from my masculine perspectives. On my return she gestures towards a chair; I sit and have my feet washed – just so indulgent! Orchids and that piped music so typical of these places – ‘The Music of the Andean Pipes’ – Thai style! Then I am instructed to lie face down on the massage table, naked; she shields me from herself with a large green sheet, although there isn’t much to see! And once I’m prone I can’t see much either, as my head is face down in that little indentation in the table, tastefully covered with white gauze. After some initial kneading on my legs, I sense she climbs onto the table and starts on my hips and lower back, I can feel her thighs against my legs and that contact is ……… She presses her torso against my back and it feels good!

Being completely naked there isn’t that pulling-down-the-hem-of-your-knickers normally associated with the masseuse working on your hips. Nicole simply moves the sheet and, besides, she’s seen it all before! I’m grateful she doesn’t chastise me for my sunburnt buttocks, the result of an hour in the sun earlier. At some point, in this warm haze of sensory overload, my arms are down the side of the table; she brushes her thigh against my hand and I smile to myself.

I ask how long she’s been in Portugal and she says she’s here for eighteen months. Her English is very limited (but better than my Thai!) so conversation doesn’t flow; she just gets on with her job, applying her skill and oil to my body. I wonder what she’s thinking as she adjusts the sheet to ensure my limited modesty as her hands massage my inner thigh; probably wondering which noodle bar she will go to when she finishes, with the other masseuses with whom she shares an apartment. My thoughts are not on supper! I learn later that a Thai company provides the masseuses for a two-year stint. 

There was certainly no sexual attraction between Nicole and me but the mere fact that some stranger’s hands are touching my skin, sometimes quite intimately, does cause feelings, strokes the imagination one might say. The fantasy suggests her asking: ‘You like something extra sir?’ but in reality that is exactly what it is, a male fantasy.  Add the fact that my masseur was a woman, so masseuse, and it’s most men’s pleasure. I say most men as some presumably are repulsed by such intimate contact, but if you are a tactile person like me, it’s heaven. I am instructed to turn over onto my back, the raised sheet much like a magician’s cloak, and the fantasies I had when ‘tummy down’ restart, as I suspect do Nicole’s about noodles.

Towards the end she lifts a leg to one side and pushes against the hip, opening that joint to its furthest extension. Wow! The Thai massage ‘Spinal Twist in Lying Position’. A few minutes massaging the hands and fingers, then my skull and I’m done. Off for a shower in a side room then, dressed, back for ginger tea and large succulent red grapes.

For Nicole this is just a professional job, what she does, and she relies on feedback from her clients. I mark her card accordingly – excellent. It cost Celina an arm and a leg, an appropriate expression here perhaps, and I hope Nicole gets at least 50%, but somehow doubt it.

On the way back from the Spa, Celina and I compare notes. She suggests a massage is a bit like a sexy dance between two strangers. Whilst there need be no sexual attraction, the act of following one’s natural rhythms and inclination can engender a feeling of sexiness. She’s hit the nail on the head; a great analogy. A true basic instinct, this sexual urge, encouraged by the sense of touch, of smell, of heat, of oil ….. and lots of imagination!

The Thai goodbye, hands together, fingers steepled, slight hardly-discernible bow and she’s gone – and leaves my empty outstretched hand, the normal British ‘goodbye’ gesture, untouched!!

Richard 23rd August 2018                                      richardyates24@gmail.com

PC 116 A Health Spa Break

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A part of me always wanted to know what happens inside a health spa – in the summer months you get glimpses of guests in white towelling robes drifting about inside or out, in some imagined state of euphoria ….. or that’s how it seems. Give it a go, huh!

So we looked at the website of a well-known UK brand, booked an overnight stay, essentially 26 hours …… and went earlier this month. As we neared our destination, the glare from the low, late afternoon sun meant that trying to find the right road at the crossroads in the nearest village, through the dirt-smeared windscreen, was a bit of pot luck. We eventually got there, to find Car Park A full, as was B and C but eventually we found a space in D; a good thing, otherwise we would have had to park under the rhododendron bushes! “Must be popular” we thought as we made our way to reception.

There were so many staff of obvious Eastern European background we wondered whether the whole venture was really some guise for money laundering. You do think like this, particularly after reading Misha Glenny’s McMafia about international criminals in the C21st!

Having checked in, been given our ‘towelling robes and flipflops’, the former a loan, the latter a gift, and dumped our bags in our room, we got the Guided Tour. Subsequently we realized it hadn’t included the restaurant, maybe as it was fully booked, and the ice room, where you can stand and shiver – probably good for closing the skin’s pores.

We go to the activities station; it’s 4 o’clock.

“Can we book for the ‘Wake Up Workout’ tomorrow morning at 0830?’

“Oh! No! Sir that’s already full as are most of the sessions.”

“Well! How about the Da Vinci BodyBoard class?”

“You can have the last two places; I’ll put your names down.”

“So is there anything else on offer today?”

“There’s a talk this evening by Ms Cynthia Welbeloved on Emptiheadedness and the Spirit of Greed.”

I almost said ‘Perfect’ but thought better of it; we could probably turn up if so moved.

Around the large pool with its glass roof were special little places for people to relax and sleep/read/chat. There was a hydro pool that was so special you had to pay extra to use it! There were saunas for men, saunas for women, saunas for both sexes ….. if you have ever been to a mixed sauna, in Germany for instance, and found nudity the norm maybe you will reflect on the reserved nature of the Anglo Saxon?

There were hot Jacuzzi-type tubs inside and out. In fact everything you needed to relax and unwind; fortunately there was no background mood music from overhead speakers, just the low murmur of people talking quietly, reverentially, respecting the whole reason why people come. We tried the pool where the water was cool and the sauna which was crowded …… and then we thought about dinner.

Despite the fact that the dining area looked like a British Rail Cafeteria, with bright lights and hard furnishings, what was on offer was good. I often judge a restaurant by how many of the options I could eat. Here I could have easily have eaten the whole menu …… although at a health spa this might have been against the whole raison d’être, irrespective of how healthy each option was!

And what of the treatments on offer?  …..  ‘Elemis pro-collagen age defy’ facials …… ‘lava shell’ massages ……. ‘Dry Body’ flotation (?)  …… etc etc. Doing hot yoga daily ensures our skin is in great shape so the only thing that tempts us is a massage. But it’s £50 for 25 minutes! Twenty five minutes? You would hardly get relaxed before it would be over …… our local people charge £40 for an hour so we thought: ‘no! no! no!’. Other treatments seemed equally pricey. Just wonder whether, if they reduced the prices, they would make more money. I came away questioning how much they are used. Maybe if we were stressed out, lived chaotically busy lives, had serious health issues, then maybe ……

At breakfast we find a good range of healthy options laid out on the buffet table and, if you wanted to pay extra, you could have Eggs Benedict, Full English etc. I tried the kedgeree with some extra mackerel; the mackerel was warm but the kedgeree cold; disgusting! The delightful waiter from Hungary asked whether we wanted coffee or tea ….. coffee please! I was suspicious as soon as I saw that the coffee came in an old-fashioned Kona glass container that had probably been sitting on the ‘keep warm’ plate for ages. You could see through the brown liquid and it tasted of nothing. Fortunately we were able to get a decent Cappuccino and double Espresso from a different machine.

After breakfast it’s apparent that Day Guests and members arrive. I overheard a BA Stewardess loudly talking into her phone to Jermima; “’course, dahlin, anytime. Oh! And I’ve booked you the ‘Decléor Ultimate Wrinkle Eraser Facial’ as I think you need it. Must dash, I am seeing Matt for a personal session at 1000.” Some presumably come every week and why not if you live close enough and you have the money? Ah! Yes! If you have the money!

We vacate our room by 1030 but can stay until 1600. After a brief discussion about where to put our stuff, we eventually decided it was best in the car boot, decanting some ‘essentials’ into a changing room locker. We do one 55 minute exercise class on a ‘Da Vinci Board’. You can recall Da Vinci’s figure with spread arms and feet? Well, here you stand on a long board, with bungees running its length, and two at each end. Lifting one set exercises one bit and another another; lots of repetitions and encouragement from Vicki from Vladivostok – ‘very gooood, very gooood; that’s it’ repeated regularly throughout the whole class. Actually quite challenging and enjoyable! 

Afterwards we shower and return to the sauna. By the time we think about lunch we could both be rung out. Having had a leisurely meal we decide that we should leave, after all, how many times do I want to swim in 24 hours, how many saunas do I want to endure?

Maybe this is just the place to come and write a postcard about those health spas  ………. but actually an expensive option; think my local café would be better, as would the coffee!

Richard 27th January 2018

Hove

http://www.postcardscribbles.co.uk

PC 74 Thoughts on Meditation and Ommmm

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My eyes are closed in meditation. “Empty your mind, let the thoughts that come just pass through, creating no judgment or comment.” More easier said than done huh? “As you breathe in, imagine the word ‘let’; as you breathe out, ‘go’”. Or we’re told to focus on ‘So ….. Hum’. (A Vedic mantra meaning “I am that” which can be inverted ‘hum …. so’ to mean “that I am.” in Sanskrit). Ten minutes and I open my eyes, look up …….. and take in the scene.

Twenty four people, four men and …… well you do the maths …. have come to southern Portugal for a week’s yoga retreat. Each for their own reason, each with their own but common goal, to do two sessions of yoga a day for six days. For those of you who have never got ‘into’ yoga, it’s never too late, you’re never too old.

The orange trees

Quinta Mimosa lies west of Faro in the Algarve, in the hills above the little town of Almancil. The 10 acre estate contains three separate houses and pools, connected by orchards containing orange, olive and almond trees; you could simply stroll into the rough grass and pluck an orange off a tree. You could swim in your own pool or take a taxi to the nearby beach. The spacious nature of the place ensures that it feels delightfully empty and we gather at yoga sessions rather like yachts on an offshore race, converging from various directions to round a mark on the course.

The studio is in the old stable block and its heritage is apparent. Large French doors on the south side, a reed-covered ceiling and tiled floor; hooks on the wall that used to take riding tackle now hang with props for Iyengar yoga practice. The occasional ant runs across the old tiled floor …. and you hope it doesn’t come in your direction as you lie is Savasna, ready for the next posture.

We are all so diverse in what we do, if you tried to describe us for a novel you wouldn’t get the group’s coincidental nature. The research biologist at UCL, an investment banker with Lloyds, two pairs of sisters, one from Walthamstow the other from London, a civil servant from the cabinet office, the blonde running a brand- awareness Internet business, a film editor for TV footage, the doctor running a health care trust, a nanny from Thailand, an Australian Chinese, a photographer, an accountant, an operations manager of a health care company, a French woman married to a Brit, a psychotherapist ….  some with children, some single with ages ranging from 29 to 58 (apart from the author!); all drawn to Portugal in June for a week’s stretching and breathing, to improve one’s practice and so one’s health and posture.

‘Ooommmmmmmm’ – the sound resonates through my chest, as we finish our hour and a half session and just let the breath out.

Food is as one might expect vegetarian. Actually it’s simpler that way, rather than catering for the likes and dislikes, the allergies and fads, just platters of vegetables fruits, salads and cheeses. The local supermarket is visited by those who need wine or beer to complement the gorgeous food provided by Wendy and her helpers. The routine is yoga, brunch, ‘free time’, yoga, and then a well-deserved supper. We sit at a long table by a swimming pool, the warm sun setting over the hills to the north west. Conversation flows amongst us, one minute strangers, the next bonded by the power of a yoga practice.

Despite three different routers, the internet provision is poor. You might think this should not matter on a yoga retreat ….. but the majority of us are wired in to emails, digital newspapers, Whatsapp, and Facebook and, between the yoga sessions, you find little groups clustered around a hot spot like wives of miners on the news of a pit collapse or some such.

Ommmm

The common threads are yoga and Paul, our teacher. Students are from three London studios where Paul teaches and over the week we exchange our own experiences of this hot yoga and why we got into it! Interesting! Some are back for their second or third year such is the uniqueness of this week.

Paul recognises that there needs to be a little levity during our practice and introduces us to ‘earthquake’ when we suddenly have to drum our feet on the floor as quickly as possible. He also takes us on a ‘walking meditation’ reminiscent of Buddhist monks; we walk slowly, silently through the orchard and around a huge ancient gnarled olive tree, round and around. I sense that northern Europeans find ‘meditation’ a little too alternative, but after a daily 10 minutes before each yoga session one begins to understand not only its benefits but also the difficulty of clearing one’s mind of the chatter – monkey mind as some people think of it.

And so the week draws to a close and thoughts turn to the normality of our lives, so distinct from these glorious self-indulgent days. Back to work, back to families, back to children, back ……. home.

After each yoga session Paul had spoken the word ‘namaste’ … and we would respond ‘namaste’. Namaste is a gesture acknowledging the soul in one of us by the soul in the other. With his desire to keep the sessions lighthearted, at the end of one he simply said: “Namaste …… motherf**kers”.  I think we’ll all be back next year!

Richard 15th July 2016                                                       richardyates24@gmail.com

PC 516 In The News

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I was going to write about the Christian Ten Commandments in today’s postcard, trying to understand their relevance to modern day society, but I got sidetracked! The word ‘God’ is possibly the most invoked word in our world; ‘the supreme being, ultimate creator and ruler of the universe’ in theistic belief systems. Certainly, Abrahamic faiths like, Judaism, Christianity and Islam see him (her?) as a single, supreme, eternal and all-powerful deity, whereas those who follow polytheism believe in multiple gods and goddesses who control specific aspects of nature or human life.

Early last month American Dennis Hastert, at one time the 51st Speaker of the House of Representatives (Note 1), died. His obituary was an interesting read; a high school teacher and wrestling trainer for 16 years, he followed that with a 20-year career as a Washington lawmaker. However, despite being a ‘born-again Christian’, a sordid tale of the sexual abuse of several of his high school wrestling team emerged in 2016 and he was sentenced to 15 months in prison. A wonderful example of a public persona masking his personal predilection for teenage boys; not very ‘Christian’.

It really doesn’t matter where you look, there’s always a bad apple somewhere, as if it’s impossible to live a completely blameless life. Hot on the heels of Dennis Hastert was the obituary of American Jim Bakker. Bakker’s Christian television network, PTL, attracted over 13 million viewers and raked in some $129m in annual revenue. The wheels fell of his wagon when, in 1987, a local newspaper revealed that Bakker had used $265k of PTL funds to buy the silence of a church secretary who had accused him of drugging and raping her. Denying the allegations he declared: “…. but we’re not hopeless because we have God on our side.” Of course! That’s all right, then? The expose brought renewed attention to his business interests, particularly his Heritage USA, the third most popular theme park in the country.

You couldn’t make it up! It seemed that the park’s 500 room hotel sold ‘lifetime partnerships’, guaranteeing buyers an annual three-night stay. They sold 60,000, twelve times more than the hotel was capable of servicing. (Note 2) I hope he wasn’t still claiming ‘we have God on our side’ when he was found guilty of 24 fraud and conspiracy charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison; he eventually served five.

It has always seemed to me that television evangelists are the modern equivalent of snake-oil salesmen beloved of Americans towards the end of the C19th. I don’t think we have many broadcasting on UK television but many years ago I was sufficiently curious in their craft to attend one of Billy Graham’s broadcasts at a cinema in London. All wonderful stuff, until you came to the diktat, that you couldn’t do ‘x’ or ‘y’ unless you followed Jesus; and if you didn’t you were consigned to hell and damnation.

There’s a large Evangelical Christian following in Brazil. Membership of Pentecostal or neo-Pentecostal churches is now estimated to be about 30% of the population, some 47 million, up from 10% in 1990, following a sharp decline in Catholic adherence, now numbering around 56% of the population. Evangelicals have become a major political force, advocating socially conservative values and supporting the right-wing politics of Jair Bolsonaro and his son Flavio. Bolsonaro senior is currently serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest, whilst his son’s defeat in the second round of the Presidential elections at the end of last month was remarkable.

Having won the first round at the beginning of October (Note 3), there was no historical precedent for Bolsonaro to lose the second. Up stepped Andre Janones, a young Congressman from the state of Minas Gerais and supporter of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, known as Lula, looking to be elected for a fourth term. Realising that some 30 million Brazilians had abstained from voting in the first round (Note 4), Janones set up a WhatsApp group called Lula’s Army, its intention to make those who had not voted before vote for Lula. Membership grew from 50,000 to 5 million a week before the vote; every day Janones sent messages, urging his followers to do certain tasks, focused and co-ordinated. Brazil is a prime territory for online political campaigns, ranking only behind India and Indonesia for time spent on social media. It worked; three million more people voted in the second round than the first.

The surprise result gave Lula 51.79% of the vote to Bolsonaro’s 48.21%. Bolsonaro cried ‘foul’ and vowed to fight the result, but within days had run away to Miami, presumably not trusting that the investigation into alleged money-laundering activities would be fair – or maybe he was just acknowledging his guilt? On reflection, maybe this was not a victory for one party’s policies over the other, but a recognition of the power of galvanising voters through a social media campaign.

Richard 6th November 2026

Hove

www.postcardscribbles.co.uk

Note 1 For those interested in American politics, he replaced Newt Gingrich and was succeeded by Nancy Pelosi.

Note 2 You may remember the forecast visitor numbers for Brighton’s i360 that I mentioned in PC 486 (April 2026)? Somewhere in the initial proposal ‘visitor numbers were estimated to be 700,000 per year. A child could do the maths: open 365 days a year, for an 8-hour day the attraction would need 239 visitors per hour for every hour of the working day, seven days a week, even if it was raining or foggy. The capsule has a maximum capacity of 200; with about one trip per hour it wasn’t realistically possible. No one dared to challenge the promoters; no one applied common sense.” The reality was that in the first year it had some 500,000 visitors but then averaged out around 270,000 per year.

Note 3 Bolsonaro 47% Lula 45%.

Note 4 Lots of people didn’t want to vote for either man, wishing there was someone occupying the middle ground.

PC 486 Hope Revisited

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I got a WhatsApp from Mo to say her mother had had a rather nasty lung infection which developed into pneumonia and that she had died peacefully in her sleep. I offered the normal platitudes about how good to go without some awful illness, either physical like cancer or mental like dementia, how without her, her own life wouldn’t have existed but understood how much Mo would miss her. We agreed to meet in The Hope Café last Wednesday afternoon.

Josh is acting as the barista and we exchange inconsequential chat while he prepares my double espresso. I see Mo sitting at her favourite table and go and join her. We chat about the loss of one’s last parent, how now there’s no one in the family older than her and how she thought her mother had lived a good life, not merely existed. One of the facts of our existence is the older we get we recognise the thinning out of our friends and family. My brother had recently said goodbye to a very close ex-RN colleague, who had been in his term at Her Majesty’s Royal Naval College Dartmouth. I wrote: “As we age, our friends will gradually slip away – just hope we’re here to say: ‘thanks for your friendship’.”

Mo’s about to say something when her mobile rings. She looks down at the number, recognises it, says: “I need to take this, sorry; it’s the undertaker.” I quickly say, “I’ll let you have some privacy” and, without letting her protest, pick up my cup and move to another table, just as Sami enters.

“Hi! Richard. Let me get an Americano and I’ll come and join you.”

Armed with his coffee, and a small plate of his favourite biscuits, he comes and sits down.

“Enjoyed your postcard about The Shipping Forecast (PC 483) Richard; for someone who’s never sailed, really interesting!”

“Richard Coles annoyed me a little, the ‘pedantic’ me I mean! When he was messing about in yachts off Cowes in his ‘Wight’ episode, he kept referring to the left and right of the boat, when I felt he could have made a little effort and used the well-known port and starboard.”

“He didn’t use ‘pointy bit’ for the ‘bow’ did he?”

“No! But he didn’t use ‘bow’ either, preferring ‘the front end’! Agh! Having not listened to the actual broadcast of the Shipping Forecast for a long time, I had a nostalgic listen the other day. You remember that Finisterre, an area of some 90,000 sq miles northwest of Cape Finisterre in Spain, was renamed Fitzroy? Well, in the forecast I heard, they split it into North and South Fitzroy. Maybe because it’s so large.”

“Did you get more comments than usual? I sense it was quite educational for some; certainly for me.”

“No, not really! Explorer 82 said: ‘A nice one’ but my brother, who lives on the coast in Weymouth, so sea area ‘Portland’, and who’s been suffering from a lingering chest infection sent this: “….. I have Connelly’s book and others including Meg Clothier’s The Shipping Forecast. Meanwhile – “General synopsis: deep low 360 (Note 1) Portland 6 filling slowly. Area forecasts …… Dover, Wight, Portland: gales of laughter in abeyance, fair I suppose, RSV brain fog lifting.”

Mo seems to have finished her call, comes over to tell us she needs to go and see him, the undertaker that is, and waves goodbye.

“Now, where were we? Oh! Yes, I was going to scream at the lack of common sense these days.

“Tell me more …..”

“The ‘i360 report’ by the Brighton & Hove City council explored what went wrong with the i360, the observation tower project that left the city writing off over £52million …… with no one held responsible. Last week’s report laid bare a basic problem; no ‘common sense’ checks. To sell the project, visitor numbers were estimated to be 700,000 per year. A child could do the maths: open 365 days a year, for an 8-hour day the attraction would need 239 per hour for every hour of the working day, seven days a week, even if it was raining or foggy. The capsule has a maximum capacity of 200 with about one trip per hour so it wasn’t realistically possible. No one dared to challenge the promoters; no one applied common sense.”

“That’s crazy, isn’t it. Can’t believe that figure of 700,000 wasn’t challenged. How many went up and down?”

“In the first year some 500,000 but it then averaged out around 270,000 per year. No one’s been held responsible and the city ratepayers are paying £2million a year in debt repayment.”

“I don’t think there’s a mechanism for holding leaders of public organisations financially accountable for the occasional cock-up. It would be a little like asking turkeys to vote for Christmas! On a different topic, you know how it is, when you see people away from where you normally see them and you think: “I sort of recognise them?” but can’t place them.”

“Oh! Yes! Context is everything.”

“On Wandsworth Common many years ago, I was walking my Labrador Tom and someone said: “Hi! Richard”. I seriously thought ‘who’s he?’, just couldn’t place him, then I realised it was Brian from Dove’s the local butcher, who always prepared my weekly pork chop wearing his blue-and-white striped apron!!! I was reminded of this the other day when we were rushing for the bus to get to yoga and passed a small group chatting and enjoying some coffee in the Spring sunshine. They shouted: ‘morning Celina’ and waved. Just couldn’t place them and it wasn’t until we got onto the bus that Celina said: “Didn’t you recognise Dr Simon, Martha the receptionist and the other doctors from The Hove Practice?”

“Ha! Ha! Hey, need to get going Richard. See you soon?”

“Off to Brazil next week so when we get back. Bye!”

Richard 10th April 2026

Hove

www.postcardscribbles.co.uk

Note 1 The number here refers to the barometric pressure. A ‘low’ pressure system is normally below 1000mb. The lowest ever recorded was 870mb measured in the eye of Super Typhoon Tip in the Pacific Ocean on 12th October 1979 ………….. I mentioned in my piece that in low pressure systems the wind spins counterclockwise. I could have added it’s the reverse in the southern hemisphere, due to the Coriolis effect.

PC 515 Hope and Birthdays

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You may recall from last week’s postcard that both Sami and I had birthday’s last Saturday. Do you think anyone has researched whether one’s friends are chosen, in part unconsciously, because of their birth sign? Both Celina, a Taurian, and me, a Scorpio, have a disproportionate number of people’s birthdays we recognise in our own star signs.

“Did you celebrate, Sami? Large cake and some fizz? I know you said you couldn’t join us at all on the Saturday, which was a great shame, so what did you do?”

“Lisa’s not a fan of cake unless it’s gluten free so, no, no cake but we did have a meal out. But mine wasn’t a decade to celebrate, unlike yours!”

“Many months ago, Celina and I discussed just what to do, in addition to splashing out on a fortnight in Costa Rica, leaving in the middle of next month. Should we hire a room in The Grand Hotel or in a Community Centre …… and just say to my contacts list: ‘Come’ ….. or just not do anything, and all the options in between? We ended up with two events. The first was a small party for some 18 of our 10 o’clock hot yoga class participants two evenings before my birthday. Always fascinating to talk to individuals away from the studio and learn more about their lives and loves.

The plates cleared away – lunch at Semola

On my actual birthday we had a family lunch in Semola, the local Italian on Church Road.”

“Now there’s a coincidence, very odd, as that’s where we went on Saturday evening! Think Luca and Roberto run a great place and the food is amazing.”

“At the top of our road is a new deli, ‘At The Table’, run by a local chef and social engineer called Sophie Taverner. We discussed what we needed from her and came up with a plan. She catered for the evening party, organised ….

… the fizz and the hire of the glasses, booked Gracey to help and made two coffee cakes for the evening party and for after the lunch at Semola.”

“After Semola?”

“We went back home for some fizz and cake and were joined by eight of our neighbours; that was good fun too. In my manuscript ‘thank you’ letters for the wonderful, inventive birthday gifts I received, I wrote that:

“The dust has a long way to go before I might consider it settled, after the delight of the past few days. I might of course measure it by the gradual decent of the helium-filled ‘8’ and ‘0’ gold balloons or by the pressure from Celina to put away my many birthday cards. I feel so grateful to be where I am, who I am, at this stage in my life and thank you for your friendship.”

I am so lucky to be in very good health despite having a triple heart bypass in 2013 and a prolapsed disc operated on in 2017; must be the six sessions of hot yoga a week!”

“Actually, that’s quite a good photograph Richard! Scrub up well, you do. You wrote manuscript ‘Thank You’ letters? Wow! How old fashioned!”

“No! No! How modern! Look, I took a photograph of the letter and sent it via WhatsApp! Some people have been surprised I have reached four score years. Most weeks I go down to the Fish Shack on Hove’s promenade …..

….. and buy some crayfish tails and anchovies in oil. If I go on a Sunday the kiosk is staffed by Edward, a very tall young man who can’t stand upright, given the low internal roof of the shack! He’s just turned 18 and has almost recovered from his own birthday celebrations. Mine, incidentally, were remarkable for the very small amount of alcohol that was consumed, although the evening party was solely fellow yogis so one shouldn’t be surprised! Edward asked how old I was.

“What are you, Richard? 55? 60?

“How old is your father, Edward?

“43”

“How old is your grandfather, Edward?

“78 ….. (although he had to pause to do the maths!)

“Ah! Older than your grandfather then!”

One present was a book from an ex-boss and now very good friend Varina who lives near Brisbane in Australia. She and husband Ron had been in South Island NZ and heard of/seen this book.

It arrived by post a few weeks ago and was put aside for my actual birthday. Coincidentally Celina was going to Portugal for a few days and cousin Toni had ordered a couple of books from Amazon UK. Varina’s book went to Portugal too! Toni denied all knowledge of it, the penny dropped and back it came to the UK and now is in my pile of books to read.”

“I read your postcards, Richard, but I sense other people do too! Remember you wrote about the RNLI in PC 513 Saving Lives at Sea (16th October 2026) and how its recent rescue of people aboard a dodgy dinghy had propelled it into the political moras of current migration debate? I was pleased that The Times had obviously read your postcard as, on October 19th, one of its Leader articles was on this exact theme!”

“Thanks Sami! But also, hard on the heels of PC 511, in which I wrote that ‘various government departments and organisations are dragging their feet over the implementation of the Supreme Court’s ruling that sex is based on biological sex; surely, they have a responsibility to implement the 2025 law whether they agree with it or not?’, NHS England updated their guidance on 15th October. They said: ‘trans patients should be cared for on single-sex hospital wards that align with their biological sex rather than their gender identity’. The law being implemented – after a year!”

The gradual deflation after a wonderful celebration

Richard 30th October 2026

Hove

http://www.postcardscribbles.co.uk

PS You should not be surprised that Francisquinha thought her birthday was the same day as mine; never wanting to be out of the limelight!