A Pilgrim's Tales
I have discovered over the years that if the cash is low being an amusing companion in a bar can with a bit of luck result in someone buying me a drink.
Here I had thought to share with those of you that I am unable to share a drink with some of those stories from my past that a little tipsy I have told and retold to half the world in the hope of keeping my glass as full as possible.
The Wheelchair
In Greece I had a succession of old bikes and only crashed them when I rode home pissed but after one incident I did learn to walk home.
I was as usual out painting the town red when I met an especially attractive tourist girl from England. She wanted to go to a beach party a few kilometres outside the town and even though I was pissed out of my mind I felt compelled to offer her a lift there in the hope of getting my leg over.
I was never to make it to that party.
I told her to wait for me outside the bar and went off to fetch my bike. I got to where it was parked, hopped on and kicked her up. I rolled back the throttle but nothing happened; in the end I was at full throttle and I couldn't understand why I wasn’t going anywhere so I leaned back too see what was going on and saw that I was still on the stand. When I leaned backwards the bike came off the stand and the back wheel came into contact with the road at full throttle. I shot up into the air like a rocket until gravity kicked in and I came back to earth with the bike on top of me. A couple of guys from the kafenio opposite ran over to help but I assured them that I was all right and just needed to sleep it off.
I slept.
I woke up extremely early in the morning when there was no one around; my leg was killing me and I could only just manage to stand. As luck would have it a policeman turned up; thank god it was Greece (no breathalyzer), he drove me to the only doctor on the island. There was no X-ray machine on the island so the doctor plastered my leg up to the hip to be on the safe side and was about to pack me off to Athens on the next boa at which point at around five o´clock in the morning there suddenly appeared from nowhere an extremely strange character; a young Dutchman dressed in a leopardskin bikini and Doc Martin's, obviously high and obviously gay who succeeded in convincing the doctor to pump me full of morphine for the pain and supply me with a handful of opium tablets for the journey . I was carried onto the boat by a couple of half pissed Scotsmen on their way home from the excesses of the night and kindly enlisted by my new leopardskinned friend who placed unceremoniously on one chair with my leg propped up on another. I was as high as a kite all the way to Athens.
When the boat arrived at Piraeus I was unable to get out off my chair partly because of the cast but mostly because of the drugs. The crew absolutely refused to help me off the boat but eventually the captain turned up, an ambulance was called and I was thrown onto a stretcher and carried off the boat.
The ambulance took me to a hospital where there was an enormous queue waiting to get into casualty and I was put on a trolley and left to wait my turn. It took about two or three hours before I saw a doctor. He asked me why I was there despite the fact that he could clearly see my enormous plaster cast, I told him the story thus far and he informed me that they did not treat broken bones at that hospital. After a long heated discussion he eventually organised another ambulance to take me to another hospital just to shut me up.
On arrival at the other hospital which was way over on the other side of Athens I was carried in and put into a bed in one of the wards. I saw no doctor or nurse and lay there half the day wondering what the hell was going on. When a nurse eventually did turn up she told me that all the doctors were on strike.
They had a weird system of care in Greek hospitals at that time and the nurses didn’t actually take care of me in any way shape or form, and I don't get fed. Most of people in the ward had broken something and were for the most part confined to their beds. It was wives and mothers that took care of getting piss bottles, bedpans and the like and had the pleasure of feeding their loved ones; most of them had makeshift beds under the beds of their relatives and slept at the hospital.
In the bed next to mine was a young lad who had also broken a leg in a motorbike accident and his mother was looking after him. He was acting like a baby when it came to pain and he just laid there muttering “the pain, the pain” all day. The Greek mother treated her son like the baby he pretend to be and had no conception of how serious or not his injury might be, her son had just broken a leg and was very clearly going to be just fine but she ran around like a headless chicken completely distraught thinking that he was going to die.
At that time I had long hair and a beard and she somehow got the idea into her head that I was Jesus Christ and that I should bless her son and perform a miracle so that he would live. What the hell I blessed him and told her that he would live. In return she fixed my piss bottles and fed me like a king. Shitting was another matter, I had no intension of using a bed pan and pulled myself out of bed and went to shit in the toilet like folk. She thought that I was incredible for doing this and thought it to be some kind of miraculous behaviour proving that I was Jesus.
It was four days before I got to see a doctor and the X-rays showed that my leg was not broken at all and that I just had a very bad sprain, they took off the full length plaster cast and put on a short one up to the knee and sent me home.
It was still very painful and hell to walk on and I was told that I could get some crutches in the basement so I hobbled down there only to find out that I was going to have to pay 3000 drachma to hire them. The little money I had in my pocket I’d spent on cigarettes bought for me by the mad mother so they sent me away without any.
There wasn’t a chance in hell that I could walk to the Athenian tube station without help but luckily for me I saw an unattended wheelchair stamped Hospital just standing there in the corridor and jumped into it. I wheeled myself to the door and got a guy in a white coat to push me to the top of the hill outside. He wasn’t about to take me any further and left me at the top of the hill. The hill was incredibly steep it was like a ski jump takeoff ramp and the road had the most ridiculous camber I have ever seen but I took my life in my hands and launched the wheelchair down the hill. By some miracle dodging parked cars and almost ending up in a drain a couple of times I got to the bottom without crashing and found myself in front of the metro station. Thankfully the Athenian metro was free early in the morning and I was helped on by a couple of soldiers and got myself back to Piraeus to get a ferry back to the island.
So now I’m sitting at the port in Piraeus without a drachma to my name wondering how I was going to sneak onto a boat without paying for a ticket. Another bit of luck; a Danish tourist pushing a bicycle came up to me and said, “You look as if you’ve been in Greece for a while. Where’s a good place to spend a
holiday? ”Paros" I replied as quick as a flash and I told him my sorry tale and promised him that if he paid for my ticket I would pay him back immediately we docked, fix him up with the best hotel on the island at a reduced price and show him the best time of his life. The ferry tickets at that time were very cheap and he went along with it; we had a fun time on the boat ride as he had a bag full of duty free and there was a bit of a storm going on which to everybody’s amusement resulted in my wheel chair (which didn't have any brakes) careering wildly up and down the bar.
When we arrived I went into the nearest kafenion where the owner was a mate, borrowed a thousand drachma, paid the Dane for the ticket, ordered some drinks on my tab and started to get pissed again; shortly afterwards one of my girlfriends who worked in a decent hotel came by and I fixed him up with the "special price for you" hotel room I had promised him.
I didn’t need to use the wheelchair to get around for very long, I was soon out spinning around on my plaster cast in the disco's but I kept it parked at one of my favourite bars so that I could be rolled home at night when I was pissed.
was working as a builder at the time and I couldn't do any heavy work for a while so I started hiring out the wheelchair to tourists that had had drunken accidents on their hired mopeds, a daily occurrence on the island, and that paid my rent.
Some months later I was being driven home (in a wheelbarrow this time) when I met the chief of police; he was a bit of a grumpy old bastard who liked to show his authority from time to time and he took offence just because I called him all the insulting things that you can possibly call a man in Greek, which is a great language to insult people in and I was ordered to leave the island. This was a fairly common event in my circles and involved hopping on a boat and going somewhere else for a couple of weeks; after that you could come back and the old bastard left you alone as if nothing had happened. I packed up the wheelchair with my luggage and took a boat to Athens.
At the market in Piraeus I sold the wheelchair to a one legged stall holder and it paid for my flight back to the UK for a little holiday.
All in all a typical night out in Greece.
How long does it take to make the Perfect Pâté?
When I first moved to Sweden I lived in a flat in a suburb of Stockholm which was as everywhere else is in Sweden near to the forest. My wife’s oldest friend had been invited to dinner and while I was cooking she and my wife were to go out into the forest and pick wild mushrooms. I had planned a fairly extravagant menu so as soon as they left I got started:
Starter
Layered Chicken Liver Pâté with Madeira Marinated Chicken Breast and Trumpet of the Dead
Main Course
Spiked Apple Stuffed Fillet of Pork in Juniper Sauce and Mixed Roasted Root Vegetables
Desert
Death by Chocolate with Cloudberries and Whipped Cream
Layered Chicken Liver Pâté with Madeira Marinated Chicken Breast and Trumpet of the Dead
Main Course
Spiked Apple Stuffed Fillet of Pork in Juniper Sauce and Mixed Roasted Root Vegetables
Desert
Death by Chocolate with Cloudberries and Whipped Cream
Pâté needs slow cooking at a low heat so I got started with that fist. The chicken had been marinating over night and I had picked and cleaned the Trumpet of the Dead the day before so I got down to mincing the pork, chicken livers and seasoning. When the whole thing was assembled in my terrine I sealed it with pastry and popped it into my oven in a water bath at 170°C to cook while I got on with the rest of my preparations. The fillets of pork and their accompanying vegetables were quickly prepared and ready to go later.
I got down to preparing my shamelessly rich Death by Chocolate cake. The mixture and chocolate cream filling were soon done and I thought about how I was going to decorate it. It was as you’ve probably guessed by the mushroom picking autumn and we had a lovely maple tree outside the flat which had lovely leaves and I decided to go out and pick some to coat with chocolate to make chocolate leaves. Everything was in control I thought so out I went to pick them. It took only a couple of minutes before I was back at my door.
Then it dawned on me; I had not taken my keys.
So there I am standing outside my door wondering how the hell I’m going to get in. We lived on the top floor and windows were not an option, this was long before we had mobile phones and I knew I didn’t have a hope in hell of finding the girls in the forest.............Shit!
After due consideration I remembered that my stepson had a spare key. The only problem was that he lived in "The Old Town" in the centre of Stockholm a half an hours journey away by tube.I didn’t have my wallet with me either of course and even if I could find someone who’d let me use their phone I have never had a head for remembering phone numbers and didn’t have a clue what his was. Directory enquiries wouldn’t be any help, he had a very common name and I didn’t have a clue what the name of his street was either. Only one thing for it; go down to the metro and sneak on to a tube.
Off I went and came to the tube station where it proved to be extremely difficult to sneak past the ticket office. There was nothing for it but to try telling my sob story to the ticket seller and hope that he’d take pity on me. I had not been in Sweden very long and my Swedish was to put it mildly very poor but after at least a quarter of an hour with the clock ticking on my pâté in the oven I managed to convince him to let me get onto the platform and I promised to pay him on the way back. I’d just missed a tube of course and it was another ten minutes before the next one came along. I hopped on and took the half an hours ride into town.
As soon as I got to Old Town I went off at a trot to my stepson's praying that he’d be at home. He was thank God. I quickly explained my predicament, got the keys and lent me enough money to get back home. Same problem on the way back just missed one tube and had to wait for another. The journey home seemed to take forever; I didn’t have my watch on as I’d taken it off to get my hands in the pâté mixture so I had absolutely no idea how long the bloody thing had been in the oven. I eventually got back, paid the damn ticket seller and went off at a run for home. I should explain that my condition was not exactly tip top even in those days; training has never been on the top of my list of pleasurable ways to pass the time and I arrived at my door a sweating wreck, panting like an old Basset and thinking I was going to have a heart attack at any moment. My trembling hands just about managed to get the key in the lock and I opened the door and rushed directly to the oven, took out the pâté. I broke the seal on the terrine and drained it and took it out.
Perfect.
Put the pâté on the balcony to cool, in with the Death by Chocolate, melt a bit of chocolate for the leaves, out with the cake, in with the root vegetables, whip the cream, whip out the cloudberries from the fridge, a bit of fiddling with the chocolate leaves and viola, just in time to welcome home the girls with a glass of wine and start pan frying the fillets.
I didn't quite have time for a shower so I was a bit wiffy from sweating like a pig but all in all it was a magnificent meal even if I do say so myself.
I got down to preparing my shamelessly rich Death by Chocolate cake. The mixture and chocolate cream filling were soon done and I thought about how I was going to decorate it. It was as you’ve probably guessed by the mushroom picking autumn and we had a lovely maple tree outside the flat which had lovely leaves and I decided to go out and pick some to coat with chocolate to make chocolate leaves. Everything was in control I thought so out I went to pick them. It took only a couple of minutes before I was back at my door.
Then it dawned on me; I had not taken my keys.
So there I am standing outside my door wondering how the hell I’m going to get in. We lived on the top floor and windows were not an option, this was long before we had mobile phones and I knew I didn’t have a hope in hell of finding the girls in the forest.............Shit!
After due consideration I remembered that my stepson had a spare key. The only problem was that he lived in "The Old Town" in the centre of Stockholm a half an hours journey away by tube.I didn’t have my wallet with me either of course and even if I could find someone who’d let me use their phone I have never had a head for remembering phone numbers and didn’t have a clue what his was. Directory enquiries wouldn’t be any help, he had a very common name and I didn’t have a clue what the name of his street was either. Only one thing for it; go down to the metro and sneak on to a tube.
Off I went and came to the tube station where it proved to be extremely difficult to sneak past the ticket office. There was nothing for it but to try telling my sob story to the ticket seller and hope that he’d take pity on me. I had not been in Sweden very long and my Swedish was to put it mildly very poor but after at least a quarter of an hour with the clock ticking on my pâté in the oven I managed to convince him to let me get onto the platform and I promised to pay him on the way back. I’d just missed a tube of course and it was another ten minutes before the next one came along. I hopped on and took the half an hours ride into town.
As soon as I got to Old Town I went off at a trot to my stepson's praying that he’d be at home. He was thank God. I quickly explained my predicament, got the keys and lent me enough money to get back home. Same problem on the way back just missed one tube and had to wait for another. The journey home seemed to take forever; I didn’t have my watch on as I’d taken it off to get my hands in the pâté mixture so I had absolutely no idea how long the bloody thing had been in the oven. I eventually got back, paid the damn ticket seller and went off at a run for home. I should explain that my condition was not exactly tip top even in those days; training has never been on the top of my list of pleasurable ways to pass the time and I arrived at my door a sweating wreck, panting like an old Basset and thinking I was going to have a heart attack at any moment. My trembling hands just about managed to get the key in the lock and I opened the door and rushed directly to the oven, took out the pâté. I broke the seal on the terrine and drained it and took it out.
Perfect.
Put the pâté on the balcony to cool, in with the Death by Chocolate, melt a bit of chocolate for the leaves, out with the cake, in with the root vegetables, whip the cream, whip out the cloudberries from the fridge, a bit of fiddling with the chocolate leaves and viola, just in time to welcome home the girls with a glass of wine and start pan frying the fillets.
I didn't quite have time for a shower so I was a bit wiffy from sweating like a pig but all in all it was a magnificent meal even if I do say so myself.
Foreign Drink
When I was a young boy of about six or seven I was taken to a Chinese restaurant for the first time by my parents. We stood outside and carefully perused the menu with photographs of the various dishes displayed in the window. My eyes fastened on the photo of Chicken Chop Suey and my mind was made up.
We went in and were seated at a table by our waiter and given menus. My father asked me what I wanted and I told him Chicken Chop Suey and pop. When the Chinese waiter came back to take our orders my father trying to be posh gave him my mothers and his own order and finished by saying: “...and a Chicken Chop Suey and a mineral water for the boy.”
“I don’t want mineral water I want pop” I insisted.
“Mineral water is pop.” said my father under his breath.
“How could I know that?” I retorted,”I can’t speak Chinese!”
Easy Rider
One day a German MC Club member turned up on the island and if you could stay on his right side he turned out to be a pretty good drinking partner.
He rode into town like someone from a Dennis Hopper film on an amazing custom built Harley chopper, the entire bike chromed and gleaming with a coffin tank, cow horns, the whole nine yards; it was his pride and joy. When I’d had a few drinks I was continually pestering him to let me take it out for a spin and he of course always said no.
One afternoon we happened to meet in the street and I for some reason I had not taken a drink and was unusually sober. Without my even asking he tossed me the keys and said that I could borrow his Harley for the day. He told me in no uncertain terms that if there was the merest speck of dust on it let alone a scratch when I returned it that he would cut me into pieces and feed me to his dogs and I had no reason not to believe him.
There are in this world a peculiar group of madmen who insist on insulting or challenging such obviously dangerous characters to a fight, foolhardy behaviour which is beyond understanding. Such madmen were all unceremoniously dealt with and ignominiously carried off to hospital never to be seen again. I have no evidence that he actually fed anyone to his dogs but I would not have put it past him.
Being well aware of the risks involved I took my life into my hands and rode off into the sunset. I had never ridden a chopper before and I was disappointed to find his an uncomfortable ride; arms stretched high on the cow horns, seat too low and the front wheel sticking out at an alarming angle, so after a fairly short ride I stopped in Piso Livadi for a drink. One drink led to another as usual and to cut a long story short I woke up the next morning in my own bed. I remembered that I had borrowed the bike but I had absolutely no recollection whatsoever of riding it home. I was relieved to find that I was unhurt and there were no obvious signs of an accident and I went outside to check on the bike. It was not there!
My last memory was of stopping at the little kafeneo in Piso Livadi so I hopped onto my own bike and rode off like the wind. There was no sign of the bike when I got to Piso Livadi and after some enquiries I heard that I was last seen climbing onto the bike and riding off without saying where I was going.
In total panic I rode around checking every bar and kafeneo on the island for several hours without any success and eventually decided to go to a friends house to try and get some help. As I rode up I could see that the bike it was there parked in front of the house and I breathed a welcome sigh of relief. I checked over the bike and there was no sign of any damage. My next fear was that my MC friend had found it himself and was sitting inside. There was nothing for it but to pluck up my courage and go in to find out, I was glad to find my friend sitting there alone drinking coffee. All he said was “You lucky bastard”. He told me that I had turned up on his doorstep in the early hours the night before, pissed as a fart and asked him to crack open a bottle of wine. He, realising the danger of the situation had refused and tried to convince me that I should sleep the night at his house but I was too pissed to see the danger and would have none of it and prepared to ride the bike home. Thankfully he had taken the keys from me and driven me home.
The keys were given back to me and I returned the bike freshly polished and shiny to my MC friend. I of course told him that it was the best bike I had ever ridden in my life and neglected to mention any further details of my custodianship.
RIP Picco
Caught Short
On the way up to London with my parents when I was about eight years old we stopped at a roadside pub for lunch. I was ordered to be on my best behaviour because I would get into trouble if anyone noticed that I was under eighteen. Thinking it rather a privilege. Butter wouldn’t have melted in my mouth.
Half way through the meal a very large and mean looking policeman came into the pub, he looked around, spotted me and came directly over to our table. He looked me menacingly in the eye and said:
“I don’t think you look old enough to be in here lad. How old are you?”
“Eighteen.” I replied.
“Don't lie to me lad you're not tall enough to be Eighteen.”
Oh yes I am, I’m a dwarf!”
The entire pub cracked up with laughter.
There was no arrest.
In the Pink
Some years ago my wife Yvonne and I went to Crete to visit our friend Maria. Shortly before our trip I stumbled upon a magnificent pink Adidas one piece garment. I have no idea what its true purpose was intended to be but it immediately reminded me of those snazzy one piece bathing suits that one sees in films and postcards from the nineteen twenties……. I had to have it.
Yvonne had warned me not to take it with me on pain of not allowing me to join her on the beach. I have never understood the pleasure of lying around on a beach for hours doing nothing but roasting in the sun. My idea of sunbathing involves very large parasols and ice cold beer at a beach bar so I was not exactly trembling in my boots from her threat; on the contrary I welcomed an excuse not to be dragged onto the sand.
Despite my protestations the day inevitably came where I was expected to go to the beach and lie on a towel for half the day. I had not told Yvonne that I had flagrantly disobeyed her and packed the offending garment. I put it on underneath my clothes before we left for the beach and on arrival casually slipped out of my shirt and trousers to reveal it in all its glory. Yvonne was not amused. I insisted that if I was going to have to suffer lying around on the beach all day then at least I was going to do it in style.
She donned a pair of sunglasses and a large straw hat in an attempt to avoid being recognised by anyone and tried very hard to blend into the background .
Needless to say after a short while on the beach I became extremely thirsty and wanted a beer. The only place I could get one was at a German run camping site at the other end of the beach from us. When I asked Yvonne if she’d like me to bring her a beer back with me she insisted that I should cover up my wonderful pink creation before I went to the bar. I refused and sauntered the whole length of the beach oblivious to the stares of all I past.
Yvonne managed somehow to merge even more deeply into the background.
On reaching the camping ground I sauntered into the crowded bar which was filled with the hubbub of chattering tourists. Immediately I walked through the door there was a deathly silence and as I walked up to the bar and you could have heard a pin drop. I ordered two beers, was promptly served them and turned around to peruse the sea of blank faces staring at me mouths agape.
“It’s alright you can laugh now”, I said. The whole place exploded with laughter and I received a bigger round of applause than I did in any stage production I can remember from my theatre days. I bowed graciously and carried the beers back to Yvonne leaving a trail of smiling bathing beauties in my wake as I passed by smiling and winking.
Yvonne was now almost impossible to find, she had become one with the sand.
A few days later Maria asked us if we’d like to go down to the beach with her for a swim. Yvonne declined for some strange reason but I donned my trusty one piece and went off to the beach with Maria. We went to a beach bar run by a friend of hers, walked onto the sand and took off our outer clothing.
Maria never batted an eyelid.
We went for a swim, took a short stroll along the shoreline and then a beer at the bar in our swimwear before going home. I have often wondered how the conversation went the next time she went to visit her friend at the beach bar, if she ever did go back.
Yvonne had warned me not to take it with me on pain of not allowing me to join her on the beach. I have never understood the pleasure of lying around on a beach for hours doing nothing but roasting in the sun. My idea of sunbathing involves very large parasols and ice cold beer at a beach bar so I was not exactly trembling in my boots from her threat; on the contrary I welcomed an excuse not to be dragged onto the sand.
Despite my protestations the day inevitably came where I was expected to go to the beach and lie on a towel for half the day. I had not told Yvonne that I had flagrantly disobeyed her and packed the offending garment. I put it on underneath my clothes before we left for the beach and on arrival casually slipped out of my shirt and trousers to reveal it in all its glory. Yvonne was not amused. I insisted that if I was going to have to suffer lying around on the beach all day then at least I was going to do it in style.
She donned a pair of sunglasses and a large straw hat in an attempt to avoid being recognised by anyone and tried very hard to blend into the background .
Needless to say after a short while on the beach I became extremely thirsty and wanted a beer. The only place I could get one was at a German run camping site at the other end of the beach from us. When I asked Yvonne if she’d like me to bring her a beer back with me she insisted that I should cover up my wonderful pink creation before I went to the bar. I refused and sauntered the whole length of the beach oblivious to the stares of all I past.
Yvonne managed somehow to merge even more deeply into the background.
On reaching the camping ground I sauntered into the crowded bar which was filled with the hubbub of chattering tourists. Immediately I walked through the door there was a deathly silence and as I walked up to the bar and you could have heard a pin drop. I ordered two beers, was promptly served them and turned around to peruse the sea of blank faces staring at me mouths agape.
“It’s alright you can laugh now”, I said. The whole place exploded with laughter and I received a bigger round of applause than I did in any stage production I can remember from my theatre days. I bowed graciously and carried the beers back to Yvonne leaving a trail of smiling bathing beauties in my wake as I passed by smiling and winking.
Yvonne was now almost impossible to find, she had become one with the sand.
A few days later Maria asked us if we’d like to go down to the beach with her for a swim. Yvonne declined for some strange reason but I donned my trusty one piece and went off to the beach with Maria. We went to a beach bar run by a friend of hers, walked onto the sand and took off our outer clothing.
Maria never batted an eyelid.
We went for a swim, took a short stroll along the shoreline and then a beer at the bar in our swimwear before going home. I have often wondered how the conversation went the next time she went to visit her friend at the beach bar, if she ever did go back.
Ape Shit
In order to make a bit of extra beer money whilst I was in Drama School I worked on an arena show based on the film Planet of the Apes. I bluffed my way into directing the original sound track and the first stage show with Circus Hoffman at City Hall Newcastle and later was to work as a performer in arena shows up and down the country.
The masks and costumes were very convincing and we rode around on horses like maniacs shooting 303 rifles amidst pyrotechnic explosions, loud music and a vocal commentary. At first the horses we rode were well trained and were unaffected by the gunshots and explosions but as time went by and the budget dropped we hired horses from the local riding schools of the towns we were playing. None of us could really ride and there were a number of scary incidents with the horses.
On one occasion, in Plymouth if I remember rightly I was given an extremely nervous animal to ride and after the first couple of explosions and a few shots from my 303 she went completely ape shit and galloped from the arena at an alarming rate.; I just hung on for dear life until she eventually calmed down and came to a halt. I hopped off like lightning in case she changed his mind and decided to gallop off again. She was covered in sweat and I was sweating even more under the hairy silicon gorilla mask and hot army surplus clothing and leather armour that I was wearing. I slung my 303 over my shoulder, took him by the reins and led him off down a track not having the slightest idea where I was or how I was going to get back to the arena.
After a while I came upon a cottage where a little old lady was on her knees weeding the garden and I walked the horse up to the gate in my gorilla costume with the 303 rifle slung over my shoulder and asked her if she could direct me back to the arena. She looked up at me and without batting an eyelid pointed to a turn in the road and informed me that if I followed that road for about a mile I’d see the arena to my left. I thanked her and went off down the road. I looked back over my shoulder and she had simply gone back to her weeding as if nothing in the least unusual had just happened. She had not looked in the least bit surprised and had reacted as if being asked directions by a gorilla leading a sweaty horse and carrying a 303 rifle was a daily occurrence.
I am not sure if I am one of these apes or not. I suspect that whilst this was being filmed I was probably still trying to find my way back to the arena.
There were a number of other incidents: