12April1994

London: 12 April 1994
My dear folks,


If ever you should come across a bar of marzipan chocolate called Marzipan von Weltruf made by I.G. Niederegger of Lubeck, do yourself a real favour. Cathy bought us some, which Jones decreed we should have after lunch. (Jones does not believe in guzzling by inclination. She saves her treats for special occasions which she nominates well in advance to allow her¬self time to savour the anticipation. Because I know that such discipline is benevolent, in the main I go along with these rulings.) As some of you may know, Jones is rather fond of marzipan. And I'm partial to it myself.

But Mr Niedereggers's is no ordinary marzipan. It is subtly laced with rum and delicately flavoured with other mysterious ingredients which lift it into an entirely new realm. It is to marzi¬pan what Portas de Ceu's almond croissants are to the standard fare. (For Cathy's benefit, let me add that its label declares that the bar contains 150g of Rumtrauben-Marzipan mit Vollmilchschokolat und Kuverture. I enclose the labels, sister, just in case you one day stumble over a crate of marzipan and wonder whether it's the real thing.)

We also consumed most of a white chocolate Easter Egg that Richard and Penny brought us. It, too, had been saved for desert at lunch. For the main course, Jones cooked a duck which she served with croutons and parsnips and white beans and it was delicious. I had just woken up from four hours' sleep following my last overnight shift and felt a little bit like a spaceman newly returned to earth. Jones' interest in cooking has been rekindled by her new lifestyle and I have been served with extra-special (high bulk, low calorie) meals. I shall not go into detail. (Jones nearly drove me to distraction during our long-distance courtship by devoting her letters largely to descriptions of her meals.) Suffice it to say that they tasted as good as they were wholesome.

After lunch we went for a long walk across the canal, down Queensway and through Hyde Park. Queensway is an interesting area, cosmopolitan, bustling and multi-layered. Establishment and fringe, fur and rags rub shoulders. Many of the shops were open - this on a Sunday afternoon. The park itself was alive with walkers, skaters, joggers, scampering dogs and brilliant beds of flowers. At Speakers' Corner, a dozen (mainly black) budding demagogues were marketing causes to sceptical groups from atop small ladders. A quintet of constables kept a watchful eye on the crowd amid the boisterous exchange of prejudices. Discovering Jesus, Mohammed and civil rights seemed to be the main themes.

Back home, Jones has rearranged the bouquet of flowers Cathy left us. They are splendid Cathy. Thank you. Jones has divided them between two vases and they grace two corners of the lounge. Other objects have taken up new positions. Jones has decided that the flat needs an artistic touch, a little of the attention it has missed while she spent most of her life pulling pictures off one satellite and sticking them on another. The toaster and draining board have hauled themselves into different corners of the work-surface and struck new poses. And there have been other subtle changes - as though some tidying force had pervaded the apartment.

There is no doubt that retirement suits Jones. She radiates a contentment that I had previously associated only with the Quintassential. The lines around her eyes have eased. Her limpet-like morning attachment to her bed has gone - although she still retires to it blissfully. She carefully marks worthwhile TV programmes - and either watches or records them. Her garden planning proceeds apace. She has begun her programme of just living. I have no doubt that she will confound such sceptics as think she will tire of it.

I too have watched a good deal of TV of late. There's been lots on. One fascinating programme focused in on half a dozen travelling salesmen and their feelings about the company cars from which they did their business. It soon emerged that the principal aim in all their lives was to climb the car ladder. Driving the base model of any of the popular reps' cars declared one to be a novice or no-hoper, someone to be passed by all and sundry. Every salesman schemed to find ways of persuading his manager to allow him some¬thing slightly special. Clearly, one wore one's car like a uniform. Its badges were the driver's stripes. It proclaimed his status to the world. One-upmanship was the name of the game.

Of course, none of this exactly covers new territory. The fascination was in the way the people concerned spelled it out and what they resorted to in order to disguise low-status cars. Their life's aim was to have a desirable model in the drive-way and to earn the respect on the motorway that motivated other drivers to move over when they glanced in the mirror. That was success, pure and simple; the disgrace of driving a base-model was exceeded only by that of allowing the driver of another base-model to overtake. Every driver could read the insignia of every other car on the road like a book. Life's passage was encapsulated in GL, GLS, GLA, GTI, GSI and CD. It made pigeons seem uncompetitive.

Away from cars! I was at work a few nights ago when a report came through saying a plane carrying the Rwandan president had crashed on landing approach and might have been shot down. The rest is history. Why I mention it is that one of my freelance colleagues, Lindsay Hilsum, who had been through a thin patch, just happened to be in Kigali. She also just happened to be (virtually) the only journalist there - and, with the airport semi-closed, likely to stay that way. She's been on every radio and television news programme we have tuned into since. When she files (to tape) she signs off for half a dozen foreign stations to allow each broadcaster the pretence of having its correspondent on the spot.

She can't have had more than a couple of hours' sleep a night. And she has witnessed more slaughter, savagery and suffering in a week that falls to most journalists in a lifetime. Once the crisis is over (i.e. when the Westerners are all out, interest has waned and the Tutsis and Hutus get on with massacring one another undisturbed), she'll be able to retire - although she made need to spend much of her earnings on a shrink.

More mundanely, I am reading Salman Rushdie's Midnights' Children. I began it in South Africa months ago and then - to my great irritation - left the book behind. The sheer exuberance of his writing reminds me of Dickens. Rushdie has a way of letting words fly about the page with such vigour and colour that they have a life of their own - dashing in and out of people's houses and lives. I am truly impressed. Mr Rushdie may be a funny-looking fellow and short on political foresight but his gifts are extraordinary. I understand why the book won the Booker of Bookers. I may even try The Satanic Verses once again.

We had half a mind to hop on to a ferry and go over to France - just because we now can and haven't for ages and because it might be fun. I even brought forward my annual appointment with our accountant to make it possible. The weather, which has been as sour as vinegar for weeks, yesterday gave us a near-perfect day. Today is mixed. Moreover Fatcat has gone walk-about and that always troubles Jones. (I am reconciled to his independent habits and the price he may have to pay for them.) So we put if off. Maybe we'll go next time I'm off - if the sun shines. (As I finish this paragraph, there's a buzz on the door and an unsmiling Mavis is delivered. Jones is happy again).

Until next time, blessings!