Friday 14^th December

On Wednesday it was our pubgirls dinner, at Sapa Rose, a lovely Vietnamese restaurant in Harrington Street.  It’s not really just Wednesday pubgirls; we are a loosely-connected group of people who used to be, maybe, MargateMums… Four of us, back in the 90s.  We have been having our annual dinner for 18 years or so.  Others come and go but the original four are still in the group.  (Barbara, Heather, Pauline, Marguerite…)  A lot of water under the bridge since those days…

When it was time to go home, there was a bit of argument about how I was going to get home.  I very firmly (and maybe rudely…) spurned offers of a ride up to Katy’s and Jeff’s.  It is out of everyone’s way, and maybe not everyone’s cup of tea, a narrow steep, winding country road with many hoppity marsupials bounding across.

I was punished for my rudeness when I got to the taxi rank…

There was indeed a nice line-up of taxis, all well and good.  I got into the first one and a sad voice said, Hello Marguerite.

I don’t expect taxi drivers to know my name so I peered at him sideways and Oh dear and oh no… It was Janos, one of the people we have been dealing with at work; the applicant in a very long and stressful dispute… He wanted to complain ALL THE WAY to Katy’s…

When I told Katy and Jeff, Jeff was bewildered.  “But how do they know your name?  And why would they remember you??”  I had to explain that in tribunal hearings the applicant, and often the respondent, nearly always get to know me very well because I am the least scary person in the room.  I am the one who calms them down, brings them tissues and glasses of water, shows them where the toilet is, smiles at them sympathetically.  Sometimes, when they are pouring out their grievances, or their excuses for certain behaviour, they ONLY look at me.  I feel like saying, No point in convincing me; look UP at the bench and convince the commissioner!

India #43

Indian newspapers were a delight.  We quite often acquired the Hindu Times, written in the most beautiful, fluid English.  I kept an article describing a cricket match, for the sheer beauty of the prose.  (Now I can’t find it to copy out some of the more lyrical bits, so you will just have to imagine.)  What we loved best, however, was the Matrimonials.  Many pages of these every day, with earnest parents seeking suitable suitors of their gargeous (they didn’t always get the English right…) daughters, their tall, hard-working sons.  It was a bit sad to see how very much appearance is valued.  Women were expected to be tall, slender and as fair-skinned as possible. 

One thing I noticed in general in India was how ALL of the models and Bollywood stars, who are so beautiful and exotic they take your breath away, are very light-skinned.  A vast number of people in India have very dark skinned, and are just as beautiful, but they never get to be Bollywood stars, no matter how gargeous and how talented.  The shops are full of skin-lightening products, and even the poorest women invest in these futile little jars and bottles.  Education and income are also very important, in the matrimonials.  So many of the sons and daughters on offer in the columns had MBAs and very important government jobs; I should imagine there was just a tiny bit of hazing around the edges of these CVs… When I told Fleur about this, she said her parents always enjoyed the matrimonials in the Indian papers when they lived there before the war.  Their very favourite one was a hopeful young lass being offered for marriage, with her major selling point being “Failed BA.”  (Well at least she tried…)