07.28.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 10.38 pm by niltiac
We all know what the silly season is, don’t we? It’s the month or so before Christmas when everyone goes slightly mad, goes to parties all the time and drinks lots of alcohol. Right?
It seems I just had that impression because Christmas in Australia is in summer, whereas in fact, it’s summer that makes it the silly season. In Britain at least, the term refers to the summer party season in July and August and has nothing to do with Christmas.
At the moment there are parties galore, particularly lavish work dos put on by media owners. Tonight I have been to the School of Channel 4 party in an old school near London Bridge. We had to wear school uniform or our closest approximation (I wore a skirt, shirt, tie and pigtails despite the fact that I don’t think I ever wore a skirt, tie or pigtails to school! I did wear a shirt but it was with a tunic). They served school dinners, had a tuck shop full of sweets, a headmaster’s office for those who craved a little discipline, a matron’s office wear you could get a fake wounds, an arts and crafts room, a fake tattoo room, a chillout library and of course free alcohol (never got that at school!) and a disco. Smoking was allowed but only out in the bike shed. It was all very silly but lots of fun.
Last Thursday I went to the Conde Nast Vintage Vegas party, which involved marquees in the gardens of a very nice hotel with roulette and blackjack tables, a full-on Vegas wedding chapel with a dress-up box of wedding dresses and a real priest, and a vintage glamour dress code. That was also loads of fun but it did turn into a very drunken affair, not just for me.
There’s also a few nice, more intimate events such as the Kirov Ballet’s Romeo and Juliet, which I’ve already mentioned. Next Thursday, my boyfriend and I are going to see Cymbeline in the outdoor theatre at Regent’s Park as guests of Viacom Outdoor. Viacom also did a party for media agencies recently that involved an assortment of creepy crawlies that you were challenged to hold for three minutes each. I held the python and the tarantula but I couldn’t bring myself to hold the scorpion. It was kind of fun in a weird way.
Caitlin with the python – after three minutes and thirty seconds! 
It’s not just about corporate jollies, though there seem to be a few of those recently. There’s also quite a few proper social events coming up. Tash is having a housewarming this weekend and Kate and Dave are having theirs the weekend after.
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07.27.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 5.16 pm by niltiac
Londoners don’t really go to theatre on the West End. If they do go to the theatre it’s more likely to be at the National Theatre or the Old Vic near Waterloo or fringe theatre. Theatreland – around Leicester Square, Covent Garden, Soho and Piccadilly – seems to be populated almost entirely by tourists in shorts and T-shirts, carrying cameras around their neck. Little wonder then that many of the plays have Hollywood or small-screen actors (whether British or not) in the lead roles. For example, at the moment we have David Schwimmer in Some Girls, Val Kilmer in The Postman Always Rings Twice, Sienna Miller in As You Like It. It draws the crowds in.
It’s a shame though because there is some excellent theatre on the West End and it’s not all musicals either. My boyfriend and I recently did the tourist thing and went to the half-price ticket booth in Leicester Square. I bought cheap tickets to Some Girls, which had been on my to-see list for a while, and we ended up in the front row!
Some Girls is a Neil LaBute play about a man who is about to get married and decides to visit all his old girlfriends (well, the major ones or at least the ones he feels he needs to make amends to) and try to smooth things over so he can start with a clean slate. At first it seems that Schwimmer is reprising the role of Ross from Friends but it becomes apparent as the play goes on that this is quite a different and less sympathetic character. There is a cast of five – Schwimmer and four very different women – but there is only Schwimmer and one of the women on stage at any one time. The sets change hardly at all, which is actually quite clever since he’s meant to be staying in a series of hotels in the same chain.
The play is very clever with cracking dialogue and lots of drama and tension. Each of the four scenes is hugely different despite sharing the same set-up (man meets ex-girlfriend in hotel to talk about their long ago breakup) because the characters and their stories are so varied. It was relatively short – about an hour and a half with no interval – which was probably about the right length given the structure of the play. You could have fitted more in but it would have been padding for the sake of it or labouring the point.
I thoroughly enjoyed it and it was even better that it was half price – on a Saturday night! I think the play is doing well but I lucked out because I went to the booth in the morning before all the good tickets had gone. It’s really nice seeing new plays rather than revivals too.
Off West End, we actually live a few houses away from a pub that has a theatre out the back. I don’t know of any theatre pubs in Sydney (as opposed to music pubs or pokies pubs or any other kind) but it seems to be relatively common here. This is a lovely pub anyway but they have shows on every night in a tiny theatre upstairs (it only has two or three rows of seats!). We’ve been to see one show there, which was called The Ambulance Chasers and was about a law firm, and keep intending to go again.
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07.25.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 4.20 pm by niltiac
Natalie has chastised me for failing to update my website for the past 15 days. Shameful, I know! The truth is you can always tell how busy I am by how frequently I update my blog. These past couple of weeks feel like they have been non-stop. On a few, rare nights off, I’ve been busy watching DVDs, reading books or else my boyfriend has been using the computer. Plus with all the other stuff going on in London, there have been other things on my mind.
Live 8 feels like a really long time ago now but I still want to write all about what it was like and also publish some pics. I wish that I had done this immediately as the mood of the capital was altered so quickly after the attacks on 7 July. But I will do so soon, I promise.
What else have I been up to? On Friday, I went to see the Kirov Ballet perform Romeo & Juliet at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. I was treated by a PR agency and they had a spare ticket at the last minute so Kimberley came too. (No one at work could make it and my boyfriend wasn’t keen). I was quite tired because I had been out the night before but it was a wonderful night. I don’t think I’ve ever been to the Opera House in London before and it’s quite beautiful so would have been great just to see something there anyway, but the show itself was fantastic. The choreography was a showcase for Diana Vishneva who played Juliet and in comparison the male leads didn’t dance so much. She was amazing – really one of the most graceful dancers I’ve ever seen. The orchestra – playing Prokofiev’s score – was superb and worth going to hear even if you don’t like ballet. I enjoyed the sets as well – the crypt set was particularly stunning. It was interesting because I saw the Australian Ballet do Romeo & Juliet shortly before leaving Australia. I enjoyed it at the time but I’m now much more conscious of its shortcomings – this production far surpassed it.
Also recently, I’ve seen David Schwimmer in Some Girls, been to the Conde Nast Vintage Vegas party, done some more rollerblading, and been looking for a push bike. I’ll write more soon.
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07.10.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 9.17 pm by niltiac
After the madness of last week – from the extreme highs of Live 8 to the lows of the bomb blasts – I went up to Wales for some rest and relaxation at my aunt’s place outside of Cardiff. Her garden is in full bloom, with the cherry tree and raspberry bushes bursting with fruit. It was gorgeous sunny weather – probably about 30C – and we spent most of it outside. We had a barbeque in the garden last night and I played ping pong with my uncle. Today we went to Penarth Pier and my uncle, nine-year-old cousin and I rollerbladed along the promenade.
Rollerblading at Penarth Pier, South Wales
Aaron playing on the beach at Penarth
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Posted in Uncategorized at 8.42 pm by niltiac
Thank you to all of you who sent messages of concern and sympathy after the terrible bomb blasts of last Thursday. Thankfully, I am safe, as are all my friends, colleagues and loved ones. The city is already resuming the rhythm of normal life, although I think it will be some time before the transport system is back at full capacity.
Thursday started as a day like any other. I was a bit late leaving the house and got to my local Tube stop, on the Northern Line, a bit before 9am (I start work at 9.30am). A notice board informed me that the line was out of action between Morden and Stockwell due to a power failure and I would have to walk to Stockwell. Nothing unusual there – my only irritation was that I’d left my comfy shoes at home and would have to walk the kilometre or so in heels.
The scene at Stockwell station was chaotic. They weren’t letting people into the station, which I thought was because of over-crowding, and there were hordes of people trying to cram onto buses out the front. A rumour went around that the entire Tube network was out of action because a power cut had caused some explosions. Moments later, I was able to confirm this with a colleague who was already in the office and had access to the internet. I tried to call my boyfriend for the first time but I couldn’t get through; this didn’t worry me since I thought he was likely to still be on the Tube.
I didn’t like my chances of getting on a bus so I started walking to Vauxhall. I decided to take an overground train to Clapham Junction where I could get a train to Kensington Olympia. I normally get the Tube but I knew that some colleagues got the overground train and that it wasn’t far from my office. It struck me that the fact that I had to go to such extremes was definitely out of the ordinary; it had taken me an hour and a half to move very little distance from my home. Still, the information I had – from both the official announcements and my calls to the office – gave me no reason to suspect anything disastrous. London has a very good transport network when it works but it doesn’t take much for it to grind to a halt.
I was on the platform at Clapham Junction when an announcement came over the loudspeaker: “This is a very serious announcement. Due to certain events that have occurred in London this morning, we strongly advise you to avoid travelling into the capital today if at all possible.” It was pretty clear to me what was meant by “certain events”.
I rang my boyfriend again but still couldn’t get through. I rang his office and spoke to one of his colleagues. He still hadn’t arrived at work, which was slightly worrying because he had left the house a good half an hour before I had, but all I could do was leave a message.
Now I had to decide what I would do. I rang the office to consult with my boss but he’d gone out for a meeting. I knew that they were relying on me to be there because I’ve been acting news editor for the past few weeks and it was a crucial time of the week with lots to do. On the other hand, I wasn’t exactly prepared to get blown up for the cause!
At that point the train pulled in. They only come every half an hour and I had to make a split decision. I was nine-tenths of the way to work … I worked in West London not Central London … and they had suspended the bus service so getting home would be a problem anyway … I jumped on the train.
I finally made it to work at about 11am. All my colleagues were safely accounted for but I still hadn’t heard from the one person who really mattered to me. Now that I no longer had the logistical challenge of getting to work, I started to panic. I called his office again but I was too choked to speak much. It was 11.20am, he had left the house three hours previously, and he still wasn’t there. I was dimly aware that the mobile networks in Central London were being used for emergency services but it didn’t really register. All I knew was that I couldn’t contact him. He works right near Bank station and, while I hadn’t heard anything about a bomb there, I knew that it was a likely target.
Finally, he called. He had been shunted from Tube to bus to bus and then had to walk the final few miles on foot. I started crying with relief and while I managed to compose myself eventually, I felt really drained for the rest of the day. I had spent all my emotional energy and now I just felt physically exhausted. Like everyone, I found it really hard to work, especially with anxiety of the homeward journey hanging over us.
Getting back on the Tube the next day felt really weird. It was less crowded than usual and the atmosphere was quite tense. It’s obviously going to be a while for everything to return to normal. Of course, we don’t even know for sure that it’s all over yet – especially now that they have determined that the bombs were detonated rather than exploded by suicide bombers.
My story is relatively inane. I was nowhere near the blasts and no one I know was hurt. But my experience one I share with thousands others. Reading the newspapers over the past few days has helped me to realise how bad it really was and how much worse it could have been for me personally. My heart goes out to all those people who were so much more directly affected than I was.
It’s so horrible and evil and I find it quite hard to fathom. Yes, there are political and historical reasons behind it and I understand that but it doesn’t change the fact that these people are murderers and I can never condone that.
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07.07.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 10.33 am by niltiac
An absolute nightmare in London this morning with bombs on the Underground and buses … After a stressful few hours, I have now made contact with my boy. We are both fine, although I am still a little shaken. Now the only question is how to get home tonight.
I have been thinking for a while of investing in a bicycle as it is about a half-hour ride along the river and through parkland to get from my house to my office in Hammersmith. After this morning I am going to consider this idea a lot more seriously.
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07.03.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 1.22 pm by niltiac
Live 8 was absolutely amazing! I will write all about it soon and put some pictures up. It was awesome on every level – I’m still on a high!
I did make it to Birmingham on Friday night and it was fun. It’s a shame I missed the actual meet on Saturday but there are no regrets. It would have been fun but not even one hundredth as fun as Live 8.
I think I need a week to recover – I can’t believe I’m going to Jamiroquai tonight!
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07.01.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 9.53 am by niltiac
A tunnel has collapsed on the train line to Birmingham – on the very route that I was meant to travel on to get to the BookCrossing meet tonight. Is this a sign that I shouldn’t go?
I have to check out if there are alternative lines in operation and what the situation is with refunds but Birmingham is looking further away than ever.
Meanwhile, my work colleagues either couldn’t go, or didn’t want to go, to Live 8 tomorrow so I have just made Kimberley one happy lady. I think she was literally crying with happiness when I spoke to her on the phone just now! All three of us are going and I am sure we’ll have a great time.
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