When
you are very old only your dimensions travel. I have grown shorter,
my mouth has shrunk and in consequence my dentures wobble.
The
compensation is that the the body only does Ageing on the Spot. The
furthest I travel is to the garden to feed my Koi.
Sadly
that will mean I will never return to my favourite cities. I won't
miss Paris which is a vastly over-rated collection of the worst
traits of the French. Nor Venice, a raddled old Queen of the Adriatic
where everyone suffers terminal catarrh. But I will miss Vienna. I
think if I lived in Vienna I would be smiling all the time. It must
be the loveliest and least aggressive city in Europe with the most
helpful population. Its joys are many.
Ringstrasse,
a circular boulevard of palaces and galleries, ends at Schonbrunn
where can be seen the gowns and toiletries of Empress Elizabeth, the
Princess Diana of her 19th century day, whose beauty and twelve inch
waist were the toast of Europe.
Grinzing,
a wine-making village that links Vienna with its woods. Within half
an hour of leaving the palace, we were toasting Elizabeth in
Heuriger, the new “green” wine, which costs 60 pence per half
pint, is recommended for diabetics and tastes deliciously like a
frosty October morning.
We
tried four Heurigen, the taverns where the wine is sold, and finally
dined at the best, Martin Sepp’s. Bettina, our waitress, still
smiling at the end of a busy evening, advised us that my order, a
Heurigenplatte of assorted warm specialities including smoked pork,
dumplings and sauerkraut, was sufficient for two, warned us that the
local Cabinet Sauvignon pudding wine was expensive at £2 a glass and
suggested we finish the meal with an ambrosial schnapps, a local
speciality distilled from the must of the grape.
Mayerling,
the hunting lodge where Crown Prince Rudolf enjoyed venison and
champagne, whilst Bratfisch, the fiacre driver he hired by the year,
sang and whistled Austrian folk tunes. The same night the Crown
Prince murdered his teenage girlfriend, Maria Vetsera, before
committing suicide. A Viennese aristocrat told us what he claimed was
the real story. Vetsera could not persuade Rudolph to divorce and
marry her so whilst he slept drunkenly she castrated him.
Understandably when he awoke he murdered her.
In
what must be the ultimate spin doctoring, Franz Joseph demolished the
room in which the couple died, replacing it with a Carmelite chapel.
When the bodies were discovered, two uncles of the girl lifted her
corpse to a carriage, propped it between them, with a broomstick
keeping it erect, so that passers by would think she was still alive
and drove to a burial chapel at the Heiligenkreuz Monastery, a superb
medieval building which was the next stop on our macabre tour.
I
doubt if it is possible to find a bad meal in Vienna. We ate
splendidly in the grandeur of the Rathaus, after a visit to the
superlative National Art Gallery; magnificently in the scarlet damask
dining room of Hotel Sacher, rightly billed as one of the world’s
great restaurants; stylishly at Noodles, a chic Italian restaurant
next door to the Musikverein, where, in the Golden Hall, a New Year
Concert is televised round the world; and where we heard a Mozart
concert by musicians in 18th century costume.
But
the taste that lingers was a delicious Berne sausage, coated in egg,
which the night porter cooked for me over a portable stove in our
hotel, the Deutschmeister.
We
saw the vivacious statues to Strauss and to Mozart, the inn where
Schubert wrote The Linden Tree, the house where Beethoven composed
his Ninth and Pastoral symphonies and the dance hall where the
Strauss waltzes were first heard. We drank delicious punch at a
rustic booth to raise funds for St Stephen’s Cathedral, we took
coffee and Torte in fashionable cafes and wondered how Viennese women
can eat so much cake and stay so slim.
**************************
Mostly
I will miss Bruges.
What
bacon is to the butty, Mandelson to mortgages, Bruges is to the beer
house.
If
you gave up sleep you could probably do a comprehensive pub crawl of
the city in just over year.
The
oldest pub, the 16th century Vlissinghe on Blekersstraat, has a
lovely garden, though people who went on opening night 500 years ago
are probably still waiting to be served. L’estaminet, Park 5, has
delicious food and great jazz. The tiny, elegant De Garre, off
Breidelstraat, serves beer specially brewed for it with generous
saucers of cheese. Then there is ”t’Brugs Beertje” across the
Kemelstraat from the Hobbit Bistro. The “Little Bear“ has
furniture you would be stuck with at a boot sale. The walls are a
delicate shade of nicotine, though rarely visible for brewery
adverts, the seats are hard, the floors innocent of carpet. And I
have got it backed as the top beer house of the Western world. It
serves 300 brands of beer, including a special ale brewed for
Christmas. With 295 of them I have no quarrel but there are five
others you have to drink in the company of adults and even then you
would fail a breath test for walking upright.
The
Fearsome Five are brewed by Trappist monks who live in perpetual
silence. They will tell you it is a vow. Rubbish. Prolonged
exposure to their beer has robbed them of the power of speech. Two
sips and you arrive at that state where conversation is easy but
pronunciation difficult. It is like being mugged with a velvet cosh.
Your mind walks in ever diminishing circles, whimpering uneasily.
What
can I tell you? When I was last there, the amiable landlord Jan de
Bruyne and his wife Daisy ran a Beer Academy in the back room where
they shared their vast knowledge of beer and quantities of their
stock with the customers. I think I attended it. I even have a
certificate to prove it. But there is no name on it, nor is it
signed. I do not know what “heeft deelgenomen aan een Seminarie
Belgisch Bier“ means and I cannot remember a thing I was taught.
If
they had sprayed Afghanistan with Trappist beer the Taliban could
have been taken by the Vienna Boys Choir. If you spilt any in the
garden you would face green fly the size of horses and butterflies
with bomb bays under their wings. Here is ale would make a cat
speak.
Alas,
I missed the pub with 160 chamber pots but I'd like to stay in Marian
Degraeve’s Kazernevest guest house which offers “clean hot
shower and musical toilet”.
*****************************
PRAISE
to the Duke of Edinburgh who neatly sidestepped when the IRA Head
Butcher attempted to speak to him.
BLAME
to Paxman for bullying the youngest MP Cloe Smith, an inexperienced
broadcaster. Paxman is in the wrong programme. He belongs in the
tabloid fringe of the entertainment business with bear baiting, dog
and cock fighting and public hanging. An excellent quiz master he is
out of his depth in a serious news magazine. A raised eyebrow is no
match for intelligent questioning and it is time that his colleagues
on the programme taught him the art in which they excel.
Or
he might with profit be sent to fag for Martha Carney, John Ley or
Libby Purves. Even that dreadful Dame on Woman's Hour could teach him
how to elicit information. He made his name by asking the same
question of Michael Howard fourteen times. Only later did we discover
that he was covering up for a production fault.
He
tried it again on William Hague, asking him over and over again if he
was certain the Tory deputy chairman Lord Ashcroft was resident in
Britain for tax purposes. Hague repeated the same slightly evasive
answer without a hint of a squirm. Like many short men he constantly
strives without success to achieve the same height as his opinion of
himself. He is a tissue paper bully, easily defeated. Angela Eagle, a
Labour politician behaved as if he wasn’t there, refusing to be
deterred from the speech she wanted to give. Visibly shocked, Paxman
backed off. A senior economist from Plaid Cymru made Paxman read
out a statistic from one of his own briefing documents to prove that
the charge he was making was statistically false. Respect MP George
Galloway discomfited him when he told him: “Don't try your tricks
on me”,
TALE
PIECE
”The
Northwich Guardian headlined “Mystery of headless monkey found in
street” . The
paper has now published a story online saying the RPSCA investigation
had revealed the “monkey” was actually a squirrel .
- HAPPY FAMILIES
Italy
has its Mafia. In Wales it is the TAFIA. Both countries are ruled not
by government but by families. In my day both HTV and the BBC were
run by three generations of the same family, The shadow Welsh
Secretary is the son of the Chairman of the Welsh Arts Council. The
daughter of An earlier Arts Council Godfather married the Secretary
of State for Wales . In Cardiff as in Naples keeping it in the family
has a special dimension.
