After Eurostar, like most of the mass transport of England last week, stopped their often unreliable service in the wake of 1.3 inches of snow and temperatures near the freezing point - quelle surprise in December! - I found myself stuck in London. As a result I raked up a handsome phone bill over the weekend. But, this being London, I found enough activities to beat any emerging boredom right in its tracks.
Talking of tracks: while the ones leading to Paris defied me this time, I carved my own into the ice rink at Somerset House, twice. Together with three reg's, we enjoyed the musical and architectural beauty of the setting at the palace, did our 1-hour routines on Saturday and Sunday, enjoyed the mulled wine and the occasional fall onto the ice (especially when I tried to let Emily listen to my skates carving into the ice up close, bending over and holding the phone close to the skates).
Saturday night we spent at the usual hang-out, Trader Vic's at the Hilton. Great food, good music and fantastic drinks. By 2:30 in the morning we had split as I had to take up my position as weekend psychiatrist of AOL's Anglochat room - a free service of the NHS. It's my way of being Christmassy and compassionate according to the spirit of the season. I extended treatment to such reg's as the schizo-paranoid AOL members coma284, brandi620, Lameducks, Sugapiehineypunch, AlteredStates (a pun of mental debilities), and the crystal meth victims Carrcrater, vickylake, crampierat and doveinamist. The sessions went by uneventful, no further actions like forced injections or straight jackets were needed this time.
I also am in the midst of reading two books; one is Paul Erdman's "Crash of '79", the other a historical account of Guernsey, a renegade island off the coast of France that was deeply embroiled with the Nazi henchmen in the 1940s. Turns out that the people of Guernsey not only fraternised intimately with the nazis, even to the point that inhabitants of neighbouring Jersey were appalled, but they also made sure that all of the island's Jews were murdered. Two concentration camps on the islets around Guernsey were sustained by the crucial help of Guernsey folks. Their attempts to white-wash their past sins for more than 5 decades have been completely thrashed by the book. Two schools on the island have been provided by the islanders to the nazis as interrogation centres, from which suspects regularily have emerged dead. Later, after the war atrocities were stopped by British invasion forces, Guernsey has used the institutions to incarcerate, torture and sexually abuse children methodically until as recently as 1997.
On a lighter note: I accumulated 18 hours of OT last week, which I will utilise this week to have Monday-Wednesday as half-days. Afternoons will be spent shopping and visits at the (Germanic) Christmas market on South Bank, with original kraut goodies like mulled tea, bratwursts, potato dishes and gingerbread from Nuremberg. My eyes will be sparkling from the glare of Christmas tinsel and lights, and my hands will embrace the hot cups in nippy temp's. Undoubtedly I shall OD on roasted chestnuts.
You may hate me now... LOL
Current Music: GEOFFREY ORYEMA - Ye, Ye, Ye
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0u5yYEEluA
5 comments:
I picked up your remarks about Guernsey and the last war as I search for Guernsey on Google alerts.
The book you comment on is palpable tripe and an insult to those few islanders who survived the occupation. It's factually untrue that there was collaboration with the Nazi's.
I know youre the messenger rather than the author, but I'd suggest that a more historically accurate view could be found by reading even the local newspaper's website:Here
Hello: I'm interested to hear how you found the Crash of '79 (Paul Erdman was my father-in-law) -- also noted with interest your comment on Guernsey -- you may want to read another Erdman novel -- The Swiss Account, which deals with Swiss complicity with Nazi Germany.
This is quite amazing:
I have met your father-in-law twice in San Francisco during my years in California (1981-1984 and 1988-1997) when I worked as foreign exchange trader at 3 different banks there. I have also read "The Swiss Account" recently (which remains relevant in a time when nazi victims have still to pursue UBS for compensation).
Paul also added the character of a friend of mine into the "Swiss Account" [Gerhard Göhler, on page 159 of the paperback edition, who lived in Orinda, CA like myself], and his wife Ursula was immortalised in The Crash of 79.
Small world!
My next book from Paul Erdman, which is already on my shelf, will be The Palace.
To: Peter Le Conte
I appreciate your comment.
In the brief posting on Guernsey I did not solely rely on the book. During my 2-year tenure on the island (2005-2007) I had a chance to speak to rep's of the States of Guernsey, and subsequently checked archives in London. Here I found references from former PM's Churchill and Thatcher.
Churchill dismissed the idea to liberate Guernsey and referred to it as a "useless and dispensible fiefdom of no strategic value whatsoever that must not imperil the war effort (preparations of the landing in Normandy)."
Margarete Thatcher once used Guernsey as an example to "not get overly excited about, it is not a worthy cause like The Falklands."
Basically, I stand by my dismissive comment. The historical record of Guernsey during the time of German occupation is hardly honourable.
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