George slaying that dragon to earn sainthood
For the first time ever I celebrated St George’s Day last week. I am not normally particularly patriotic. Sorry if that sounds a bit negative, but it’s true. In recent years I think patriotism in England has unfortunately become a complex and controversial issue, often confused with football hooliganism and/or racism. Where once the sign of a flapping Union Jack on someone’s car windscreen would represent patriotism, it is now associated with anti-social behaviour or potential siding with the BNP.
However, encouraged by a few English colleagues, I switched my work days to be in on Friday and we all (four of us) dressed in the required red/white/blue paraphernalia. Unfortunately, this coincided with an informal chat about a potential job opportunity at work but I think I managed to explain away my bizarre appearance. We spent the day telling our Kiwi colleagues why we had strung up Union Jacks and St George crosses around the office and after a quick google search were able to explain just who St George actually was (a dragon slaying, maiden saving hero by all accounts).
Like most other countries in the world it seems that St George’s Day even in New Zealand is mostly forgotten or ignored. On St Patrick’s Day a few weeks ago, the entire organisation headed out to celebrate and the city of Auckland became a sea of green and gold. Why is that? Kiwis are anglophiles in general and in June, there is even a public holiday to mark the Queen’s birthday.
This weekend was more importantly ANZAC weekend, remembering those brave souls. I haven’t yet made it to the dawn service at the Auckland War Memorial which is supposed to be a fantastically moving event.
Anyway, on Friday night after we headed out to the Cock and Bull pub for a few beers and a stomach lining roast beef, yorkshire pudding, gravy and chips, we headed to the Bluestone Room in the centre of town, which is a pub that reminds me of the dark and cosy, vaulted pubs in Brighton along the seafront. It was full of the kind of folk you’d normally cross the street to avoid though – tanked up, red faced young men with union jacks emblazoned across their chests, but the atmosphere was good natured. Disappointingly the face painters (who we’d been looking forward to visiting) were long gone. After a few cocktails (Mojitos – not very English, but we couldn’t stomach any more ale) we headed home feeling pleased and yes, quite patriotic as we sang Rule Britannia! in the back of the taxi.
I woke up the next morning feeling distinctly knackered. I wasn’t hungover per se, just exhausted to the point of needing lots of coca cola, saturated fat and a 2 hour nap at lunch time. The fatigue continued for the rest of the day but I’d made plans to see Julian Clary at The Edge on Saturday night. I am not a huge JC fan, (the friend I went with had suggested it back in January and I’d agreed to go.) I find him only vaguely amusing and had read some very lukewarm reviews of his Lord of the Mince tour, so wasn’t overly excited about the night out.
My expectations were met and I thought he gave a very mediocre performance. The audience was obviously full of die hard fans who forgave his numerous “stumbles” and hesitations as he forgot his lines. There were a few funny moments when Julian engaged with the audience and pulled a couple of people up on stage and I do admire anyone who puts themselves in that position of being onstage purely to “make us laugh.” But I have to admit, I have laughed more at Pepi‘s party tricks (her latest being walking backwards, which she does with a look of mischievous glee on her face until she bumps in to something) than I did at the jokes on Saturday night.
So yes, I had a fun-filled thoroughly “English” weekend and the Sticky Man was on babysitting duty twice. And because of my need for naps, he was also on daytime duty quite a lot but even so, didn’t complain once and found the time make us delicious non-anglo Japanese style chicken teriyaki and salad for dinner last night.
Gotta love him.
Peregrine Tale 