Three weeks in and I am happy to say nothing has changed. I admit that I have been prepping for ‘Retirement’ for quite some time, so it would never come as much surprise. A number of people still seem to be baffled at the whole retirement thing; “But what are you going to do? Have you decided to take up golf? Are you going back to uni? Are you going to learn how to play tennis?” Happily the answer is No to all of the above. I think the word retirement needs to be updated. It probably has and I missed it. Was it Gary Neville that famously described a long weekend break as a mini retirement? Any suggestions of a better way to describe the time spent after you stop work until you just stop would be very welcome.
I have no urges to do anything new in my life. I guess starting retirement at the beginning of the year could be similar to making a New Year Resolution. Have never been able to stick at anything for very long which isn’t always helpful but I know in my heart that if I say I will do XYZ every morning, or ABC three times a week, it will happen for maybe two weeks tops.
A few people asked me if I had any plans for my retirement. My stock answer was more travel and walk more. Maybe get a dog (Husbant agreed to this while in merriment over the Christmas period but denies all knowledge. Plus I have never owned a dog so would have to learn how to be a dog owner – see earlier comment about sticking at things). So yes I am excited at the thought of being able to travel at anytime rather than squishing it in during the three months between working for three weeks and having another three months off. And to visit new places is high on the agenda. Arriving in a city that I have never been to gives me a thrill. It is a great balance between being a bit nervous and excited. Scientists or medical people might explain it as a rush of adrenaline, or maybe a fight/flight response. I think I am more of a flight person really.
Despite the idea of spending more time travelling to new places, I have spent most of my retirement in Barbados. I think I have written about our trips to Barbados before but it is a very special place. To wake up and go swimming in a warm sea that is 20 paces away from your front door and spend some time just reading, eating and having the occasional rum-infused cocktail is pretty good for the mind. But it does feel different this time. I realise I am very lucky to be able to come here. Having a birthday in a hot place after many, many years of cold birthdays (and even a few on the annual Blue Monday when apparently everyone is depressed except me) is very lovely. Am happy to make an exception to my new rule of only going places that I haven’t been to already. I also admit I will be going back to Sicily later in the year, and to Bristol. But I am also going on a cruise (no, not that sort – more of a fine-dining/gourmet/catch your dinner on a small boat off Skye) and walking in the Dolomites. i would like to investigate a month’s train pass for Europe, or a cycle on a new route in the UK. Or Mexico.
I have just approved my final piece of research. SA approved – SJP is no more! I know I have retired before but this time it’s for keeps.
So I wanted to share some thoughts. My first job in the ‘City’ was as a database administrator at BZW in June 1987 just 4 months before the October crash. I got the temporary job through a friend of my dad’s. That was how it was. At BZW, I met Richard Kersley who was working as a graduate trainee in the strategy team. Little did I know that 25 years later we would work together again. But that’s how a lot of my working life has been.
It would be easy to give a potted history of where I worked, and how my work life unfolded. For me, it is more about the people I’ve met who had a big impact on my life. Given that I have worked in 11 investment banks over the last 38 years, I am bound to forget someone. If that is you, I apologise. You still meant a lot to me.
After a year or so at BZW, I moved to Phillips & Drew – or by the time I arrived, UBS Phillips & Drew. It was there that I met Jo Fontaina who became Jo Powell when she married my brother, Nick. And it was there I met someone who was a big influence on my career, the lovely John Smith. He fought for me when Terrible Smith made me redundant -and later he hired me in my best-ever job at DLJ. But I am missing out some important people. After UBS P&D, it was Gavyn Davies and Nicola Clark who saw something in me. I remember being asked in my Goldman Sachs interview if I had any questions. The only one I had was whether they would ever employ Terrible Smith who seemed to have followed me from BZW to UBS.
I had my kids while at Goldman Sachs – being a working woman with kids was quite a new concept in investment banking at that time. I had only been working at Goldman Sachs for 3 months when I fell pregnant so telling my boss was more scary than telling my mum. Charlie Brown was very supportive and I was given 12 weeks maternity leave plus the option of getting my job back. This was an amazing deal. Given that my daughter was a week late meant that I went back to full time work when she was 10 weeks old. Regrets? That’s a tough one. I was able to take the full 3 months off when my son was born and relished the time with my daughter – a full month we had together before he was born. Amazingly Goldman Sachs allowed me to return part time – very forward thinking for 1995! I met another woman who was to play a significant part in my life – the amazing Helen Cavendish (Nee Karney) who has continued to be a great friend and travelling companion. She even swapped clothes with me one time when I was going to an interview at Banca IMI for a new job. I got the job mainly because of the sharp suit I was wearing. Helen went home in a maternity dress – I often wonder what Adam might have said. I took my first ever business class trip to spend a week in New York with the lovely Lynne Sherwood and her team in the US – thanks to Liz Christie I stayed at The Carlyle Hotel where Lady Di used to stay. I also am indebted to Paul Krikler who at that time was a pharmaceuticals analyst. He guided me through the whole process of how to get the research out the door and to the printers when I was left to run the team unexpectedly in my third week. I also met my second husband while interviewing him as my maternity cover. I was keen to hire him but the worry was that he played football on a Monday night so wouldn’t be able to stay late if needed. Thank goodness that has all changed. We were destined to meet much later…
So a small Italian bank was great as a single mum with two little ones. Stefano Mazzola and Paolo Bergamaschi (also ex Goldman) helped me change my working life so I could spend more time with my kids by working one day a week from home. The technology was excruciatingly slow with a dial-up and high pitch squeal the only way to work remotely. And then along came my hero John Smith who offered me a job at DLJ. It was such a great place to work. I met up with loads of people with whom I had already worked and we had fun. Proper dot com boom fun. Although it lasted only 2 years, it was very full on and busy. It was my first job as a Supervisory Analyst – I had been trying to pass the Series 16 exam for a number of years – too many to count. I got to fly to Hong Kong where I met Virgina Mumford, another incredibly inspiring woman who introduced me to the jade markets and acupuncture. We had a great team and I loved working with Alison Anderson (Docherty) and Annabel Sykes.
When DLJ got bought by CS I wasn’t that keen on joining a firm by default and John Smith negotiated a redundancy package for me. Such a great man. I was fortunate to go straight to Lehman Brothers where John Wilson (ex UBS) hired me as the first and only Supervisory Analyst in London. I spent nearly 10 years at Lehman and we had such a great time. Alicia Ogawa was a great mentor and encouraged me to step up to a global role for which I am so grateful. She was so wise. Too many fab people and I don’t just want to write a list. But I do want to thank Martin Haas, Andrea Johns, Riaan Meyer and Jennie Cornell for being fab.
Ian Colley was the best compliance person I ever worked with, followed closely by Jane Regan. And, of course, the lovely Gary Peters who later became my Husbant.
It would be remiss not to mention the IT guys – Matt Kinsella and Raks Sondhi. They made our lives bearable, particularly for Martin and Gary when somehow the IT guys managed to get the World Cup games streamed onto the workstations….
The demise of Lehman was a hard blow – and I felt really sad that the magic of being in a globally cohesive team was blown apart. Bloodied and bruised (ok, bit dramatic), some of us ended up at Nomura. I stayed my statutory two years and hit a glass ceiling for the first time in my working life. I took a step down from a “managing” role and convinced the two Credit Suisse greats, Richard Kersley from BZW days, and Steve East that I would love a regular job working at the coal face. So began the longest job of my career. Again, some familiar faces were there including Andrea Johns. Was funny how 10 years earlier I chose not to join CS when it bought DLJ. I made lifelong friends at CS, including Chris Counihan, the best chemicals analyst the world has ever seen (pay me later, Chris) Matthew Weston (ex DLJ, ex Lehman), the loveliest pharma guy, fellow muppets Patrick Stewart and Monique Tremblay. And two of the best humans, the lovely Angus Coats and Pat Gowdie.
CS allowed me to take a two-month sabbatical so after working non-stop since records began, and throughout my life as a working mum, I did my own Eat, Pray, Love – but for me it was more like Eat, Eat, Pray. My first day back in the office I bumped into Richard and Steve on their way out for a coffee (or maybe a meeting). I felt that I had changed a lot in that two months but in reality, nothing had changed in the working environment. I realised I wanted to work part time and while it seemed a little ironic that I started working less once the kids had left home, I loved it.
For the third time in my career, the firm I worked for collapsed/got bought out. Thankfully, I was made redundant a couple of months before it happened, recruited by Steve East to build an SA team at Redburn. It was an interesting time but I felt I was a little too tired to start all over, working full time again was difficult. I did get to work with Lucy Heming who I think is the youngest SA globally. I went on to work at HSBC with Alison and Andrea again – but the world had changed enormously since COVID and I knew I wasn’t in the right place at the right time. I decided to retire so I had a few months off before I was offered the best SA job in the world by Nilendra at Deutsche Bank. The perfect job for a matured, experienced old timer – just a few weeks every few months. Some old colleagues were quite envious. I hope I have been able to introduce a new way of allowing SAs to enjoy an easy slide into final retirement.
All good things come to an end and I took the decision to leave my life as a Supervisory Analyst. It has been so much fun. Most people I met outside work never understood exactly what I did. “Sort of editing and compliance. I have a license which means I can approve research.” Too many words that they didn’t understand and their eyes would glaze over. So having the best job meant living a great life – and I managed to find that balance so that I worked to live. Am sure the world of Supervisory Analysts will change significantly in the next few years. We often used to joke that robots could do our jobs and then found numerous reasons why they couldn’t (but they could build a robot to check stocks!). With Lucy bringing the average age of the global SA universe below 60, am sure there will be a new cohort of SAs just loving the idea of reading weeklies/dailies/pre-results/breaking news/flashes/post-results/quarterly reviews/outlooks….. the list is endless but at least one person is reading every word. And my son has thought he might consider becoming a Supervisory Analyst…
So having to write this as I am bound to forget some of the details, but today was the first time I have ever entered a police station and sat in an interview room.
Having binge-watched Adolescence last week when I had COVID, I felt I had done some preps. Wow, that was a pretty amazing series. I watched the whole thing in one go so it felt like just one long screen shot.
Back to today, though. I recently wrote about how my birth dad, Harry, was murdered in 1980, and how I have recently met up with my half sister and we have been looking for more details on our dad. Today was the day we had a chat with a Detective Inspector and a Family Liaison Officer (I am not saying names because I have no idea if I can). We went into an interview room and I noticed the chairs were screwed to the floor. It reminded me of the Mens Bar in the Students Union in Newcastle where the agric students used to have a weekly session and end up throwing all the furniture around, so the powers-that-be decided to screw everything to the floor. The same reason was given for the interview room. How scary would that be.
The reason for our meeting was to learn more about Harry’s murder. We had sent some questions in beforehand as events took place 45 years ago, and all we had was a couple of blurry newspaper articles with scant detail, most of which transpired to be incorrect. That’s journalists for you. Bending reality to sensationalise and tell a story they think people want to read, despite not knowing the full facts. So DI (let’s call him John), DI John explained what he had found out given they had the police records from the time. He explained that policing in the 1980s was a very different thing to now, and that this was apparent in the records that they held. Everything was on paper and the language used reflected the world as it was then. I completely got that. When I first got hold of my adoption papers, the language in the forms, correspondence and descriptions of the people involved were a snapshot of the society in the early 1960s. For example, I was handed over, aged 6 months, to my new adopted parents by the Bournemouth Moral Welfare Society. Reminds me of a Monty Python song…
Anyway, I digress. So, three men, known to Harry, turned up at his flat in Bournemouth to do some business. As I kind of worked out given the information I had already, Harry was a bit of a wheeler dealer. An Arthur Daley of his day. The words in the report were “lovable rogue”. He didn’t have a jewellery shop but kept his jewellery in a big leather case at home. How he got the jewellery was not 100% known – so he was a “fence”. He had a few different ladies living with him at different times. So it looks like he enjoyed his life but it was quite messy.
The three guys turned up one Saturday afternoon having been drinking. They wanted to sort some business out but things turned nasty. Harry was hit by the butt of a shotgun, a decanter and stabbed in the neck with a kitchen knife. They ran off, jumped in their car, with his jewels, and were arrested about 12 hours later. The car had been seen outside the house by two sets of neighbours, and the three men were already known to the police. They were arrested and confessed to everything.
There’s no need for me to go into loads of detail, but at times it was like listening to a radio play or an audiobook as DI John read out some paragraphs from the various reports. How they had buried the leather case in the garden and one of the girlfriends was walking about wearing the jewellery. It seemed like a story Ronnie Barker might tell in Porridge.
We were with DI John and his colleague for a good hour and a half. It was brilliant. We found out that Harry had a sister who identified his body. So we have some more leads to find family members. What we both really want is a great photo of Harry. Given it was the 1980s, there were no photos of Harry in the police reports and those that were taken were of the crime scene which I didn’t want to see and weren’t offered.
They were all sentenced, one for murder and aggravated robbery, and two for manslaughter and robbery. That is all I want to know about them. My interest lies solely in Harry and I feel like I have a little more definitive colour on the “lovable rogue”. He wasn’t a drinker, but loved to gamble. And probably was able to charm the birds off the trees. We probably have lots of siblings out there somewhere.
Checking the boring details, he was 2 inches higher than stated on my adoption papers (5’ 11” not 5’ 9”) – maybe he carried on growing into his 50s. He was balding at the front of his head and had grey/brown curly hair at the back. I am glad he was a bit of a character and not some boring accountant.
Husbant reminded me that I had actually been in a police station earlier this year – in Barbate following a robbery at our villa. I had forgotten that but it didn’t really count as I had no idea what was really going on as the whole interview was in Spanish but luckily we had an interpreter and I was on holiday. But it’s a fair cop…
Off to Naples tomorrow to eat more Italian food, drink more Italian wine, and look at some beautiful art. Ciao!
The world seems to be imploding and a lot has happened since I last wrote. I lie in bed some mornings and write blogs in my head (and sometimes in those wakeful hours in the middle of the night) but rarely actually write them down. Not sure why today is different and I hope it doesn’t meander through too many side roads. I thought I had started writing one a few months ago but sadly it hadn’t saved in my drafts folder. So from scratch then…
Just after writing my last blog I was diagnosed with Lyme disease. I had been feeling a bit achy, slight numbness in parts of my body, fuzzy brain, generally tired and even napping in the day but I guessed that’s what happens when you get old. I had an insect bite on my shoulder blade which had been around a couple of months and I realised that that was not quite right one morning. Sending a photo of it to the doctor led to a phone call and blood tests. A trip to A&E resulted in some antibiotics and advice to rest. My blood test showed active Lyme bacteria and a dormant one that was many years old. An urgent MRI was requested by my doctor which came through eventually for mid-November. Am feeling much better but still have some days when I am really tired, have achy legs, and the numbness feels more weird than usual but it doesn’t prevent me from doing anything. Justin Timberlake was diagnosed around the same time so he’s in good company.
So, the advice to rest as much as possible led me to think about what that would mean. I had a chat with my lovely friend Ness and we agreed that we had spent most of our lives working hard and playing hard but that didn’t involve any actual ‘rest’. Even holidays with the kids were full on – working full time as a single parent meant that the holidays were filled up with as much as possible to maximise active time with my kids (clearly, they may have a different take on those holiday memories). So I have been practising resting. It has confused the cats who join me every now and then as I stay in bed for longer in the morning, or binge-watch something on the telly (Slow Horses, wow). I think I can handle the resting but I still feel guilty about it.
My last blog ended with me getting ready to meet my half sister and begin to unearth more information about Dad 3. I realise I have 3 ‘Dads’ – Dad 1 (my actual dad who taught me how to high-jump in the garden and was an inspiration throughout my life), Dad 2 (my birth mother’s husband who is the sweetest man and lives in Dorset) and Dad 3 (Harry the gambling man who liked fast cars, fishing and was a ladies’ man). A bit like a Dr Seuss story – Dad 1, Dad 2 and Dad 3.
Meeting Debbie was fantastic. We were both slightly nervous but we got on really well and realised that we were probably not the only ones in our genetic family. She is great and we have met up a few times over the last few months. We found another sister and perhaps another brother. Not everyone wants to be ‘found’ which is understandable. Debbie and I are off to the police station to meet a Detective Inspector who has more information around the murder and trial of Harry’s murderers. I can’t wait (weirdly there is a programme on Radio 4 while I write this about someone’s dad who was murdered – a bit distracting). It feels like I should write a book but as I find it hard enough to write a blog regularly, I think a book would be a big ask. I did start a book years ago and then a friend needed a PC and I had a spare one which I gave her. I forgot that my ‘book’ was on the hard drive…
And Sicily. I was lucky to spend a week travelling round southern Sicily with a great friend. I can’t say too much as will be going back again next year. But I love Sicily – the food is incredible – too many delicious things to name but the tomatoes (even better that those from Conil, in my opinion) and the freshest bufala mozzarella cheese (straight from the buffalo, Husbant will understand) need a special mention. The wine is too drinkable – Etna has an ever-present wow factor as it steams constantly. The mineral-rich soil produces delicious wines. One quick story from our travels is worth telling and won’t be a spoiler. We were heading to a ceramics shop in Caltagirone and saw a farmer selling tomatoes and grapes by the side of the road. Oooh! Shall we buy some? Yesssss – even though we only had one more day in our airbnb and probably didn’t need a load of tomatoes, the temptation was too great. The bags of tomatoes were 4kg for €10. A bargain. But we didn’t want 4kgs. We wanted 2kgs at the most. Our best haggling had no impact. The farmer wasn’t budging. The tomatoes shone bright and red in the sunshine saying “eat me”. We folded and bought 4kgs of tomatoes. When we got back to our airbnb, we emptied out the bag. And that’s when we realised the reason the farmer wouldn’t give us half a bag. The beautiful tomatoes were about two inches deep. The rest of the bag were a little bashed, old and wouldn’t win anything at a vegetable show. But oh my – we had a good fill of fresh delicious tomatoes and I even managed to bring some home to cook for Husbant. He can’t wait to go next year.
Time to get up! For no relevant reason, I dedicate this blog to my friend Alison who is running 50km around Kent this weekend. Best of luck, box of frogs.
Took a while for me to arrive at a title for this blog. But I have to thank Neil for sending me this Leonard Cohen song when I told him about my latest craziness. The words don’t really fit the story – or maybe they do – but the title is perfect.
As you know, I was adopted and was lucky enough to meet my birth mother in my 40s but my dad, Harry, remained a mystery. I knew scant details from what I had been told growing up, my original birth certificate (yes I have two birth certificates – I am Karen on the first one and Sarah on the second one), and from what my birth mum was able to share. Even later, at my birth mum’s funeral, her best friend from school, Anne, shared more information about Harry.
So beginning at the beginning, my adoption papers show that Harry Smollen was a 30 year old Jewish fruit machine engineer, who was lively and charming, 5ft 7 ins, with brown eyes, and curly hair, and loved fast cars and fishing. Sounds like he might have been quite a ‘flash Harry’ given that this was the early 1960s. I particularly liked the fast cars and fishing. Building on this picture, Anne told me that she had also been out with Harry and that my birth mum had never told her who my father was. Harry loved a party and Anne thought he was probably a little older than stated on my birth certificate. So the mystery grew.
Googling Harry Smollen didn’t really bring much – and I tried a few Jewish websites to see if his name popped up. Harry could have been a nickname – so he could have been Harold or Hyman, Smollen could have been Smollan. So it was quite perplexing. With very little to go on, I accepted that he would remain a mystery. It would have been great to have a photo of him – just to see if there was any family traits in me or my kids. It is weird growing up in a family where you definitely don’t look like your parents or siblings but it didn’t bother me. I was loved and cherished.
Fast forward to a few weeks ago. I got a message from a genealogy site saying someone had matched with me and was probably a half sister. (I have talked about how usually they tell me I have a potential 5th cousin’s cousin or something). A half sister! On Harry’s side! This was amazing. I was stunned in a very excited way.
We contacted each other simultaneously. And with the help of someone who has been looking after my family tree for a while (another Sarah), more of the mystery was being revealed. Despite the sensitivities, it was truly amazing to exchange messages with my half sister and we have arranged to meet up for a coffee next week.
Sarah then sent me a photo of my dad that she had found. I almost exploded. For as long as I can remember, I have wanted to see a photo of my dad. And this was it!
His photo was at the top of an article entitled “Flat murder: Three held”. It goes on to say “THREE men were arrested yesterday following the murder of Bournemouth businessman, Hyman Smollen.”
Later in the article it says he was a jeweller and had been involved in the booming slot machine business in the 1960s. (Check – yes this is what I knew from my birth certificate)
It goes on to say “Business associates said he gambled heavily, and was known as a ladies man before his marriage in 1976.” (Check – yes Anne had said he had many girlfriends in the Bournemouth area in the 1960s – everyone loved Harry.)
So this really was my dad. He died suddenly in March 1980, murdered by three men. This story is really only beginning. I have so many more questions now. But it feels like I have a proper base to start researching more about Harry. It sounds like he had many friends but perhaps some enemies too.
I wrote in an earlier blog of a time when I was very young going on the ferry to Spain with my family and begging to be given my holiday money so I could play on the fruit machines. Reluctantly, my mum gave me 12 of my hard-saved pennies and I came back with more pennies that I could hold in my hands. Clearly gambling is in my genes.
Yesterday, Husbant and I went in search of Harry’s grave. I am going to keep calling him Harry even though he is Hyman. I had been to the cemetery before as my daughter and I found a picture of a gravestone that we thought could be his. Googling his name now, the first photo that comes up is his gravestone.
We wandered about an area of the cemetery that I had missed the first time but had no luck. We then checked where I had looked before but no luck. Husbant suggested re-checking the first section and within a few minutes I had found it. The weirdest thing was that I had parked my car just beside his gravestone! It was as though he had led me there. Spooky!
I feel so positive and happy about this. I know for some people they might think it is a little odd to be smiling in a photo by a gravestone, but I think Harry might be OK with it and I finally got to meet him, even though he is six feet under.
Those of a nervous disposition may want to look away now…
And yes that’s my car!
Before the big reveal, I would say be careful what you wish for. I am still hoping for a better photo of Harry. Meantime, here he is:
Hyman Smollen…gambler
Feel free to comment on any family likeness below. 🤣😂
…but sometimes age comes alone. Welcome to my world. Am in the fortunate position of being almost permanently on holiday which I still haven’t worked out. Being on holiday and being retired are the same thing, no? The gaps between working and not working are now, the reverse of when I was working full time. My brain struggles with that concept but the freedom to travel, stay in bed all day, read all day (kind of linked to staying in bed), practise qi gong, yoga, pilates, weights (but definitely not zumba) – the list is endless and am loving it.
I had said I had retired last July to much fanfare and epiphanies. Even a poem. But winters are long and my SA pen was itchy. So I do a little bit of work every now and then. Husbant wants to end up slumped over his laptop hitting “approve”when he is 90. We all have our wishes.
So the wisdom thing. Was thinking about a holiday I went on 40 odd years ago with a university friend – backpacking round Egypt. We were both pretty naive travellers but somehow managed to survive all the near-death experiences. The only argument we had was over a ceiling fan. We were staying in a hostel in Luxor – we had our own room – and it was very hot indeed. No air-conditioning except a very noisy ceiling fan. I had read that you shouldn’t sleep with the fan on all night as you can get dehydrated while my friend believed that without the ceiling fan she would not be able to breathe. We had a window but that just let in dust and noise. The ceiling fan merely moved the same hot air round and round. I have always had a fear that ceiling fans would fall from the ceiling and end up slicing me to pieces. Irrational but a strong belief. In the end, I would like to think we reached a compromise and the fan was given half the night to keep the air moving. Staying in a little slice of heaven in Vejer, we have a ceiling fan. I love it. Being older and therefore slightly less aware of noise, I don’t hear the whirr but just feel that great sensation of a light breeze on my skin. I don’t have the irrational fear of it falling down on me in the middle of the night. I have many other irrational fears which come with being old – I guess Oscar Wilde might have added with age comes wisdom and irrational fears.
Being old but not wise also works. I am aware of a decline in my ability to recall many every day words mid sentence and sometimes even what I did last weekend. It is frustrating trying to describe a lost word – recently it was ‘rush hour’ (so two words, maybe my counting has gone to pot too). I ended up saying “that time of day when all the cars are on the road and people are going home from work.” So almost 20 words when 2 would have been just fine.
Am much better remembering meals I have had, beaches I have lain on and seas I have swum in. I embrace the fact that one day, which might have already arrived, I can walk up a mountain and feel like it is the first time I have taken that particular route.
It’s been a while since I wrote. Being in Vejer triggers so many happy memories. It’s blowing a hooley at the moment but the sun is shining and I can see Africa. Life is good. Be seeing you!
Ensalada de atún en tataki con sorbete de yuzu y citronela, El Campero
A girlie weekend in Riga is definitely not the same as a stag weekend in Riga. On the flight out there were two stag ‘parties’, a load of lads who barely know each other thrown together a thousand miles away from home and expected to have a fun weekend drinking lots of beer. Luckily, they didn’t decide to start drinking on the flight although I did notice one of the stags (or is it ‘bridegroom-to-be’) removed his wedding dress at the border control in Riga. I was sat next to a very friendly Latvian marine engineer whose English was excellent but I think a few of the conversations went down some weird rabbit holes, particularly when we were talking about copper piping.
Our AirBnB was centrally situated and the owner clearly loved rope. Every light-fitting involved about 10 lights hanging from various forms of rope. I had a narrow bed which felt a bit small and the cushion-as-a-pillow always feels wrong to me. However, as I soon found out, actually sleeping in the bed was just a challenge in itself. It seems the partying never stops in Riga and the cobbled streets act as natural loud speakers.
But I am rushing ahead. We ventured out for beers before dinner and found a Michelin recommended restaurant, Tails, which was a 20-minute walk away. I had read about Latvians love of sprats, so we ordered some, along with some padron peppers, tuna tataki, and fish tacos. It was almost like being in Vejer and Arizona in one sitting. The butter was pretty.
It seemed like the stag carts (you probably have seen them in other cities – 10 or so lads appearing to cycle while sitting at a bar with a glass samovar of beer) go through the night. At one point during our first night I thought I heard a shot but it was just my 3am mind playing tricks.
Feeling less than rested, but actually not too bad, we went for breakfast at the Big Bad Bagel place – a second choice as the ‘This Place Has No Name’ was closed. Interesting name given the history. I had read a review that the bagels were freshly made each morning and that the Bacon in Mexico bagel was tasty. It was. The service everywhere was extremely slow and seemed to get slower and slower as the trip unfolded.
Bacon in Mexico in Riga
The more efficient member of our girl gang had pre-booked a tour guide for the day. A big thank you for that. Harijs (say Harrys) was probably one of the best tour guides I have ever had. He was funny, had an amazing mind full of stories and facts, which mingled in a way that kept you guessing what was true and what wasn’t. It was Latvia, after all. He was a teacher and if he had been my teacher at school, I would have looked forward to his lessons more than any lessons I attended ever. He started by asking if we knew any famous Latvians. We ummed and errd and then he put us out of our embarrassment by saying he loved asking that question and watching the guilt fall across our faces. There were so many highlights, honestly. At one point we were standing outside The Three Brothers which is the Latvian Museum of Architecture. There were two guys standing outside it playing a tuba and a french horn. Harijs explained that they listened to which language the group of tourists spoke and played a tune which they felt represented the tourists’ country in order to get good tips. It just so happened that the group standing next to us were from the Ukraine and Harijs recognised the tune immediately. As the group disappeared inside the museum, the band started playing a tune that sounded like ‘Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag’ but was definitely not that. The most musically astute member of our girl band recognised it. The most moving moment came when the Ukrainians came back out and the guys played a haunting song that Harijs explained was a sort of anthem that the soldiers were singing, well everyone in Ukraine are singing. Will not forget that moment. Harijs then lead us through the art nouveau area and told great stories about the architects who he seemed to have known personally so great was the detail but obviously he wasn’t alive in the early 1900s. It just felt like he was.
He also told the story of when he was about 7 years old and he was celebrating his name day and he learnt of the death of a child in the 1991 in a time of increased Soviet military activities. Until that moment, his parents never discussed politics with him. If you grow up in an environment when you can’t trust anyone for fear of being reported, it must have an everlasting impact on you. I think the fact that he called his tour company Honest Tours is actually very meaningful.
We ended the tour at the Central Market which was in five Zeppelin hangars; a meat hangar, a fish hangar, a cheese hangar and then a couple of others with a mixture. We tasted some freshly made cheese with rye bread and hemp paste, some delicious smoked pork, bbq chicken wings, some pickles (well, lots of pickles) and ended with some toffees.
Life cycle of a pickled cucumber – 2 days to 3 monthsMainly river fish in the marketThe real thing
The Russian embassy now stands on Ukraine Independence Street and opposite the exit is a medical museum with a great banner.
The medical museum
There were so many interesting places that we didn’t have time to go in and see everything – the barricades museum was one that I sadly didn’t get to, and the Dome Cathedral has the largest organ in the world, or maybe the largest wooden organ, or maybe Harijs was embellishing a little. But we didn’t have time to go in. Definitely worth a visit though.
Saturday night we went to Kolonade on Harijs recommendation. Again the service was a bit slow but our resident wine expert chose a lovely white wine which went well with (so many Ws) the fish. I think the fish was cooked sous vide as it was a weird texture.
After a better night’s sleep, say four hours rather than the previous night’s two, we set off for three places we decided to investigate further. The first was St Peter’s church tower which handily had a lift to the viewing platform. Great views of the city!
Next stop was the art nouveau apartment that was maintained exactly as it was when the architect lived in it. Bit disappointing but the stairwell was awesome!
The next stop was the KGB museum. Initially I had been keen to see this but in the middle of the night while I was unable to sleep I read some reviews. By the morning, I had decided that I would go and see the free bit but not join the tour. As I get older, I know there are images that I would rather not have seen. My feeling here was that there were rooms in the KGB museum whose walls would have such darkness that that my ever-shortening life did not need to see. I understand the notion of “lest we forget” and that it is very important to acknowledge the terrors of how humans can treat each other. So I watched a film of some survivors and waited for the girls in a coffee shop. I think I made the right choice.
To wash away the horrors, we went to the seaside! The train was great – and took us all the way to Jūrmala. The Baltic Sea was warm – no tippy-toeing for me. It was very shallow and unsalty. So more like a lake really. There was a sandy beach and we bathed and basked for a good few hours. Our next trip has to involve a beach or a swimming opportunity (not cold water).
We were worn out and full from a great meal at a Georgian restaurant and some beers on the way back that took about an hour to arrive at our table, so plumped for a local pizza place for our gala dinner. It was an ok pizza but wouldn’t win any awards.
I slept well (must have been all the swimming) and the last day, we bade farewell to two of our mates, and we went in search of a good breakfast and some funky art. We found both. The breakfast was homemade sour dough toasty and yummy coffee.
The art gallery reminded me of Tate Modern. It was housed in an old cork factory and there were two exhibitions.
Zuzeum, Riga
There were some amazing pieces in both exhibitions. But the one we both liked was entitled ‘Two Sonnets’. My cleverer friend noticed that the two installations had some matching items and probably, if spoken in Latvian, might have some kind of rhythm. But even if they didn’t, it was a great way to interpret the objects.
So with a storm brewing in Riga, we headed to the airport and flew home. The same stag parties were on our flight – no wedding dress this time. I hope they have great memories of their trip. I know I have. thanks, Ricky Roaders for another fab trip – see you again next year!
Never ceases to amaze me how, at 7.15am, there are thousands of people in the departures ‘lounge’ at Gatwick airport. Families with kids mainly as it’s probably the first day of the school holidays. I have been up since 5am so goodness knows how long some of these guys have been awake. I guess I was once a frazzled mum with two kids heading off somewhere at silly o’clock. But today, am flying off to Riga for a few days, meeting up with my old uni mates – we are all graciously old now.
Am disappointed with the croissant from Pret. Something must have happened in the kitchen. Perhaps it is the butter or maybe it was a left-over croissant from last week. A Pret coffee and a croissant is my staple at the start of any airport journey. I can’t even finish it today. Hope it’s not a harbinger of the food to come. Am expecting dumplings and meat broths but secretly hoping for something new and perhaps fishy. Riga is a port, right? Haven’t done as much prep as I usually do for a trip. Have been too busy being retired.
Quick shout out for this month’s book club book. It came with me to the US and stayed unread as I didn’t have a moment to read anything other than a map. I opened it on the Gatwick train from Guildford. Am hooked. It’s brilliant. No spoilers for my fellow book club readers, but I gobbled up three chapters and can’t wait to carry on. It’s Tom Lake by Ann Patchett.
Just boarded flight to Riga. Plane is configured 3 seats one side, 2 seats the other side. Feels a bit lopsided. But am sure we will arrive safely. Met up with one uni mate who caught a train a 4.30am – I didn’t know trains ran that early! Makes my 5.30am a bit tame!
I loved The Prisoner, a psychological drama filmed and first broadcast in the late 1960s. When we were students in the early 1980s, Channel 4 started showing it again and I’d go round to 87 Brighton Grove to watch it with my mates who had a telly. A few years later, I went to Portmeirion and loved it. Seemed a bit like a pilgrimage.
So I have retired. It’s such a weird thing to say. And I am still trying to work out whether I have actually retired. Or whether by saying it out loud enough times and to a number of people, it will seem more realistic.
Having been a long termer in most of my jobs, the last 18 months have been quite challenging. I seemed to have worked at two firms which are at opposite ends of the spectrum. I guess joining a firm where you are just a number when you log on should have been an early red flag. A tiny cog in an enormous machine just wasn’t my bag. In The Prisoner, Patrick McGoohan plays Number Six, a British intelligence officer who resigns from his job and while packing for his holiday, is drugged and transported to The Village. He spends every episode trying to escape, and arguing with Number Two. Enough said.
But happily that is all in the past. Unlike Number Six, I have escaped. I hadn’t planned that sort of ending to my almost 40 years of corporate life. Which is why I am still thinking that I am not 100% done. Maybe my SA pen might come out in a new way at some point. Never say never!
A long-time colleague who has also retired told me to commit to retirement. It’s a bold statement but I do like it.
My first week of retirement was the best week I had had for a very long time (besides the recent holidays). The sun came out and stayed out all week. My parking ticket got cancelled as the authorities agreed with me that I had not contravened the parking rules (I had paid and was parked in an electric car spot in my etron) and the Parking Enforcement operative had been over-zealous. Always challenge, that’s my mantra. I went to Pilates a few times, and yoga a few times and my step count grew enormously. I started to remember what a life without stress feels like. And the week ended with a meal in the garden with some lovely mates where we sat out until late in the evening round the fire. These moments are very precious and fill my soul with happiness.
My good friend John even wrote me a poem. It is marvellous. Thank you, John.
PS. I had to embargo this blog for a few weeks and it has been almost two months since I wrote the above. It feels like a lifetime ago.
The biggest change has been my concept of time. When you are working full time, every moment of your non-work time is very precious. When you are no longer working, the luxury of having all the time is incredible. I have time. No need to rush around. The traffic light is red – no problem! It will turn green at some point. On my recent road trip with Bert, we had an itinerary. But it was loose enough not to feel any stress. And we arrived at the right hotel on the right day.
I love travelling to new places. I feel some big trips brewing and perhaps travelling in new ways. There is the adage ‘travel broadens the mind’ but I would add that ‘time broadens the mind’ too. Friends and family around the universe, I may be popping in for a cuppa.
Waiting to board one of those double-decker planes that seem to be too biggly to fly. It’s 15 minutes delayed already but it’s a long flight so 15 minutes doesn’t really touch the sides.
We had a fab few days in Venice Beach. Went for a delicious meal at Felix where the young and beautiful hang out. I had pasta with lemon and Bert opted for a pizza. It was a little hip for me but we were given little seats at the end of the bar so we felt like we were on the naughty chairs.
The sun disappeared as soon as we arrived in Venice. We had booked a 5-hour food tour for the first day which had high points and low points. We toured Chinatown, Vietnamese cafes, Spanish and Mexican areas and Little Tokyo. The first stop was a tea shop where we drank tea and had some yummy beef dim sum and a pastel de nata (or something like it but not very tasty), with some dried pineapple chunks and mango slices.
The beef dim sum was very tasty
Bert got a fetching new hat and we stopped at a bakery that sold real cream cakes. Very rich but at least we only got one to share.
Next stop was for an egg sandwich. Yeah. Reminded me of a food tour in Delhi when one of the stops was at a place where I ate a mango jam sandwich. It was a pleasant egg sandwich and the bread was white but not sugary. Onto a small Vietnamese place that sold bahn mi – which were delicious.
Five hours later, we had had enough really. So when it ended at the Central Market – which was just a load of restaurants – we had an ice cream. It did have a big chilli stall but I had no idea which ones to buy.
While quite full, we had to check out the In N Out burger place that is exclusive to California. The burger was actually quite tasty but the chips were too flaccid. We forgot to ask for them to be crispy.
Our final full day we cycled down the path to Santa Monica and the sun came out. It was great to see everyone out – loads of people had music blaring out of speakers while they roller-bladed, skated, cycled, mono-cycled, tricycled. The amusement arcade beckoned us and we played air hockey, shot some hoops, did the “penny” falls. We won enough points to get two bright blue chewy sweets. Well worth it!
Pedalling back to the hotel, I went for a swim and Bert poked his toes in. I had a delicious delicious taco from a beach bar (it came with 4.9 rating which was 0.1 too little).
Gala dinner was a disappointment – the place was too dark, too loud so we had to shout and the waiters were rubbish. The food was nothing to speak of and didn’t warrant a photo. The pre-dinner cocktails on the roof terrace of our hotel were very good though. We should have just stayed there.
So today, Sunday 14 July, and we were planning to join some fans at The Olde King’s Heade in Santa Monica. It was heaving by the time we got there so went on to the next place that was reservations only. Luckily we bumped into some other English people who said there was a Mexican bar round the corner which they had watched the semi in. Hot-footing it, we got front seats at the bar. It was a good mix of English and Spanish fans. But I think the shouts were louder when England scored.
So I am coming home to a country that will feel a bit down because of the football and a bit down because of the weather. Am bringing a bit sunshine with me and can’t wait to see husbant, who is performing Live and Direct at the Howling Owl tomorrow night. And to hug Bella.
Thanks to Bert for being a great travelling companion and ace navigator. For being calm when I was fussing about where to park or how to turn. It was an amazing trip.
Snoo's kitchen 