H.T.B: The Legend

It was as if the wise and weathered megalomaniacs from the nautical tales of Conrad, Stevenson, and Melville all fused into one, and we just happened to sit next to him.

A few housemates and I went to a pub, adequately named “The Boater.” It’s right near the river that runs through Bath, but we had no idea it attracted the sea-fairing sorts. We got our drinks and sat down in a corner of the bar. The tiny tables in front of us had very elaborate carvings on them, and we realized that there were faces by our nether regions. So we joked about how they must enjoy that, being on every leg of every table. “They’re probably all over the place,” I commented, “they’ve positioned themselves strategically around the world!”

A gruff voice interjected.

“And how would ye do that?”

We turned, and there sat a portly old man. His small, delicate hands were cradling a gin and tonic, which he was burning a hole through with his green eyes.

“How,” he asked, finally turning his head toward us, as if it was a great burden, “how would ye strategically place yourself around the world?”

“Well,” I said, hoping I could joke my way out of the exchange, “it’s a very complicated process…”

“I’ll tell ye,” he grunted. “I know a thing or two about positioning yourself around the world. Y’see, I’m a mariner.”

We all showed the adequate amount of surprise and respect.

“I just got back from Nigerian waters, the worst place I ever been. And I’ve sailed five of the seven seas. Twelve of me men was kidnapped-”

“Kidnapped?” I asked in shock.

He raised an eyebrow.

“What, ye haven’t heard?” He tossed his head back and gave a hearty chortle, creating an expression that made me feel incredibly ignorant.

“Why, I’m not lyin’! Here, I carry two passports, one full.” He took two passports from his black jacket pocket, and handed them to me. “Go on,” he said, “take a look.” Sure enough, stamps from Nigeria. “Y’see this watch?”

He then removed his watch and passed it around the table.

“If I ever get kidnapped meself, I pull that there knob, it sends a beacon out to the royal navy. It costs a fortune to get rescued; my wife would probably say ‘keep him!’”

We were all amazed, and he could clearly tell.

“I give a good story, don’t I? I’m from Whales, like all those great actors who come from Whales, I have presence, I know how to deliver!” He lifted his hands and deepened his voice, “Anthony Hopkins, Richard Burton, they all got it.” He patted my friend Amanda on the knee. “Do I scare ye? Don’t be scared, what’re you drinkin’?”
“Jack and coke,” she answered.”

“Jack and coke!” He exclaimed, “Well now! When you’ve known Jack Daniels as long as I have, you call him Jon! Jon Daniels!”

He looked around at the rest of us at the table.

“Know your movies, Paccino said it. You’ll be looking for that quote for seven days, I guarantee, and then you’ll find it. Then you’ll think back, and say ‘that bloke we met in the pub was tellin’ the truth!’” He chuckled, and then leaned in. “Because, y’see, you will never, ever hear a lie from me. And that’s the truth.”

So, am I to believe that a man who knows the value of giving a good performance will never tell a lie? He asked us our names, and then introduced himself.

“I’m Harry, but you can call me what all the shipmates call me. H.T.B., Harry The Bastard.”

So he bought us some drinks, and we offered to buy him one. He scoffed, and whipped out a receipt for his paycheck. It was over 9,000 pounds. “Now who’s buying who drinks?”

Then he took us down some stone steps closer to the water, and took us under a bridge to a shady nightclub. The bouncer told us all there was a pound cover charge. Harry told him he knows the manager, and he went to talk to him. He came back and got us in for free. The club had lots of fluorescent flashing lights and loud music, with little hidden caves everywhere with separate DJs and dance floors.

Harry sat us down, jerked his hand toward the dance floor, and tried to talk over the music. Apparently, he claimed to have been part of “London’s underground dance club scene” in the eighties. He gave me names of location, no doubt meant to impress, but they were meaningless. But, because of those glory days, people know him, and he gets in for free.

He started to roll his own cigarette and told us never to start smoking. He looked at my roommate.

“Do you golf?”

“What?”

“Golf. At the end of your life, you’ve done one of two things: you either were a golfer, or you were a sailor.”

To his surprise, my roommate has sailed before.

“Well then,” Harry said, “you can trust him. He’s a sailor.”

There where too many gems like this one to recount, but then things got a little weird when he asked me to accept Christ as my savior.

“I can’t really do that,” I said, “my last name is Kantrowitz.”
“That’s alright,” he exclaimed “mine’s Silverman!”

I don’t know if we’ll ever see Harry again. Although he has my roommate’s number and offered to take us for a ride on his narrowboat, I have a feeling he likes to maintain the appearance of a murky enigma. He struck me as an effective showman, one who knows that the novelty can wear off after too much exposure.

Birthday Weekend Extravaganza: London

From Bath Time!

On February 15^th, I turned 21. I’m old. 21 is a big deal, or so I’m told. When I woke up, I went to the bathroom and looked at my tired, unshaven face in the mirror. I wondered “is that what a 21-year-old looks like?” I don’t feel 21.

Thankfully, although I’m an entire ocean away from most of my friends, I managed to have a wonderful birthday. My housemates purchased all sorts of fancy beverages for me, including huge jugs of Thatcher, my favorite cider in the UK (or should I say “favourite?”)

From Bath Time!

Then we went to the nearby pub, The Ram, which is a block or so from our place. That was just with the housemates, and we had a jolly good time. From there, we went to a pub called The Pig and Fiddle, which is probably the best pub name I’ve encountered. Via the magic of Facebook, we invited the whole program to The Pig and Fiddle, and lots of them attended. So I had a great time with all my new acquaintances, especially those who felt it necessary to buy me a birthday drink. Photos of the evening abound, and can be seen here.

From Bath Time!

Then we went to a club, which was a pretty crazy experience. The place was called “Cube,” but everything inside was rounded-off and space-aged. It was like waiting in line for Space Mountain, only with dancing, and laser shows on the bar. Everything was lit with fluorescent green or blue, very sparingly, to really sell the whole mod-space station look. To make things stranger, they don’t play typical dance music. They play really good, solid classic rock. But people dance to it, the way you’d imagine people would dance in a club. So, being the rock enthusiast that I am, I was pleased.

The next day, I took a train to London, to visit the Matts. Matt Schwartz is studying at Westminster, which apparently is equivalent to a community college. It’s on Baker Street, so of course there’s a huge stature of Sherlock on his block. He says his classes aren’t challenging in the least, but this just gives him more time for soaking up everything the city has to offer. He also travels a lot; he went to Barcelona the previous weekend.

So on my first day in London we checked out their Natural History Museum. It’s like the one in New York, only British. Then we purchased a cheap liter of cider and went to a club. Once again, not dance music, just awesome classic rock, sprinkled with some new indie favorites. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, but a good time was had by all.

The next day we saw St. Pauls, and took a bridge (with a spectacular view of monuments like The Globe,) going over the Thames to the Tate Modern. The Tate is really incredible. So much great stuff, including this amazing film on four screens next to each other in a large room. On each screen is a different musical moment or snippet of a song from a classic film. The sound from the clips all play at the same time, and the segments were carefully selected to work well together when their sounds combine, (mostly even in the same pitch!) and often make completely different songs. The Tate also has tube slides that you can take from level to level.

We also went to the National Gallery, and saw a great Impressionism exhibit, entitled “From Manet to Picasso.” As the title implies, there were lots of famous paintings by the likes of Renoir and Van Gogh, which are even prettier up close. The National Gallery is so big that we only really spent time on one floor, and were too overwhelmed to continue to any others.

It also happened to be the Chinese New Year, and the National Gallery is very close to Chinatown, so we checked that out for a bit. It was packed, everyone holding inflatable pigs (since it’s the year of the pig,) and lots of street performers dressed as dragons. I’ve never seen so many Caucasians and so few Chinese people in Chinatown. We ate at a buffet-style Chinese restaurant called Mr. Wu. That’s right, Deadwood fans, Mr. Wu. Our waitress was pretty rude to us, but the food was great.

It was interesting to be in London after spending so much time in a small provincial place like Bath. London is a legit city, brimming with superb public transportation, ancient buildings, and generally rude people. Seriously, I thought the Brits were supposed to be incredibly polite and agreeable, hiding their scathing condemnation behind witty, flowery language. Not the case. Regardless, London’s a pretty cool place, with so many amazing cultural happenings I still have yet to experience. And with round trip tickets for thirty pounds, I don’t think this was my last visit. Especially since we failed to see any theater!

Stratford

From Bath Time!

My Shakespeare class took a day trip to Stratford on Avon, and it was pretty great. Unfortunately, the weather was terrible, very wet and cold, so we didn't explore very much. We did get to see Shakespeare's birth place. It's a building. And not even the original building.
We also got to visit the Shakespeare Center and look through their archives of previous performances. We looked at photos from the play, a copy of the script (showing what they cut and altered,) and reviews. We looked at different productions of "Taming of the Shrew," from 1960, 1978, 1982 and 2003. The 1960 one looked cool, Peter O'Toole was Petruchio, and Ian Holm was Grenio. The reviews said it had "warm human undertones," and was "more than farcical." Sounds good. Much better than the 1978 version, which was apparently a "wild orgy of destruction." That looked like a weird production, they tried to combine modern English with Shakespeare's original text, and it's messy.
Then we got to see Henry VI, part I, a play that is rarely read and rarely performed. Our Shakespeare professor explained that this is the case with most of the "histories." probably because the tragedies and comedies are easier to follow. And he's right, Henry VI was hard to follow. The general plot: the French are stupid and evil, and the English are noble. So, not much has changed?
The play was really well done, and did its best to hold our attention with all sorts of cool spectacle. Because the play takes place during a war, they found cool ways to depict the battles. There was a great deal of swordplay, but also lots of rope-swinging and acrobatics. There were ladders on ropes that would come down from the ceiling, used to depict watchtowers. Then enemy Frenchmen would swing in and kick at them, and actors on the ladders would fall and dangle from their harness. We sat in the balcony, and that's where a lot of the actors would prep themselves for swinging down to/over the stage.
One interesting thing was the depiction of Joan of Arc. Obviously, since she's with the French, Shakespeare needs to make her evil. So instead of being a Saint, she's a whorish master of the dark arts. The French promise her that if she helps them out (by predicting the future and casting spells on their enemies,) then history will remember her as a Saint, and all will praise her memory.
My favorite part was probably the section with Talbot and his son. Talbot is supposed to be the most feared English commander throughout France. One of the soldiers comments on how he just needs to should Talbot's name in order to win battles. However, thanks to Joan, the war takes a turn for the worst, and Talbot's pretty certain he's going to die. However, on the battlefield he finds his son, who he hasn't seen since he was very young. He begs his son to flee and take revenge if he dies, but his son refuses. So they fight and die together. There's a really great monologue Talbot delivers as he's dying, about how "these old arms are now the grave of young Talbot." Or something like that. The guy who played Talbot was really great, and it was a nice moment of human emotion tucked away in a play about large themes and grand spectacle.

Salsa con Karaoke

From Bath Time!

Above is my frustration that someone had a camera to document the fact that I took a salsa class here in Bath. However, it wasn't a completely terrible experience.
We were told to "get involved" in the local events happening here at Bath outside of the ASE program, and a bunch of kids were gonna go to salsa, so I figured "Why not? It'll probably be hilarious." Silly me. It started out alright, everyone lined up and followed the instructor's steps. I even went to the front row because I was so gung-ho about it all. And it was fine, I managed to get the steps down, but couldn't really figure out how the hip movment coorilates with it.
Then we were told to create a large circle, with guys on the outside and girls inside. We were then taught steps to do with a partner, which was both more challenging and awkward. Unfortunately, the bulk of the women I danced with were not girls from my program, they were locals. And a large percentage of those locals were middle-aged women. Some of them were very nice, in fact one even broke the steps down for me better than the instructor had, in a very polite way. She's in the photo above, I think. However, another tried to do the same thing, and she seemed pretty pissed that I couldn't get the steps right. One also yelled at me for stepping on her toes. One rather rotund woman slapped me on the cheek after I completely fouled up the steps, and said, laughing, "alright, love, you learn to live again!" I think that means "don't be hard on yourself?"
One woman, however, was awesome. Both of us were pretty terrible, and she was down to break it down. So we made up an awesome jig.
There were a couple local girls my age, and thankfully they sucked as much as me. One girl kept telling me she was "rubbish" at it. Another girl, however, got really into it. She gave me these intense salsa/passion/death eyes, and was extremely sharp and forceful with her movements, throwing her head around and such. Intimidating. Although salsa started out fun and silly, it ended with me being very ready to leave.

From Bath Time!

Karaoke, however, was nothing but pure fun and awesome times. My roommate Jed and I sang "Tribute" by Tenacious D, and we brought down the house. We really wanted to do some Al Green or Marvin Gaye, but the song selection was pretty disapointing. Regardless, "Tribute" was really fun to rock. Some girls sang "Gangter's Paradise," which I thought was pretty awesome.
I also learned that the local brits actually know how to sing. This girl sang "Phantom of the Operah," and she was incredible. Who the hell goes to a Karaoke night and thinks to themselves "yes, I think I'll sing something operatic and epic this eveining?" Talented people do, that's who.

Salisbury Dead

From Bath Time!

Dead Guy # 4, 5, & 6: Jackpot, triple score dead count! See them in the background?
You don't see tomb after tomb like that at any churches in California...or Temple Israel of Hollywood for that matter.

It should be noted that there were way too many at this church for me to be photographed with, including one really creepy one that was painted, and the people's eyes were oddly huge and bugging out.

Avebury (stones that henge, but are not Stonehenge)

From Bath Time!

Avebury is without a doubt so much cooler than Stonehenge. Maybe the formations of the stones isnt as impressive, but you get to walk up to them, touch them, and walk all around the steep hills of the surrounding area. It was also a really nice day.

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It's funny how much ancient stuff impresses us Americans, but to the brits it's just non big deal. They put a road straight through the Avebury henge, and built a town around it. It's as if they're not as precious with certain parts of their history...or maybe Americans are too precious with the little amount of history that we have.

From Bath Time!

Salisbury Church

Salisbury is a little town near Stonehenge, with a very huge, gothic church.

When you walk into the church you're blasted by some powerful organ music. The place has incredible acoustics, and the organ sounds amazing!

This is a photo of the oldest working clock in the world. It has no face, it just connects to the bell tower and tolls on the hour. Pretty crazy.

Stonehenge

From Bath Time!

We went to Stonehenge today. It's impressive, but check out the photo above. Look at all the damn people, and look how far the designated walkway is from the actual stones. So you get to walk around the thing and marvel at its mystery. Granted, it's pretty awesome, and one of the oldest most historic things I've ever seen, and I totally understand why they don't want us getting so close. But walking around the stones and finding myself in a gift shop felt a little lame. And no, I don't want a Stonehenge hat, I don't want a limited edition Stonehenge medalion, I don't want Stonehenge candy bars.

From Bath Time!

From Bath Time!

Dead Guy # 3: "Mounds" are places where people are burried without a tombstone. Instead, there's a lot of earth around them. So this is a mound, it kinda counts as a dead guy, right?

Pub Life

Bath, ASE, and pubs all lead to new friends. This is probably my favorite pic taken in a pub. Lizzie doesn't know how to ponder correctly.

From Bath Time!

Oxford

From Bath Time!

So yesterday I got myself a student rail pass and went to Oxford. The trains really confuse me; I don’t know how people understand it. Thank got for old women and rail officials who sympathize with my confusion. Unfortunately, the train I was on was delayed two hours, sitting barely outside the station where I had to change trains. Apparently the train in front of us had caught on fire. So I start talking to the guy sitting next to me, and of all the people to sit next to on the train, I happen to gravitate to the only other Californian. It was pretty strange.

It was great to see the Matts. Above is a pic of us sampling the strange UK candies. Mine was called "Yorkies," and on the side of the candy bar it said "NOT FOR GIRLS." So I thought "wow, maybe it's a really intense candy bar..." Nope. It's nothing but pure milk chocolate. We also walked around a local inside market area, and watched a woman make a cake/sugar sculpture of Thomas the Tank Engine.

From Bath Time!

Oxford is pretty great, it’s much bigger and more “city-like” than Bath (although Schwartz assures me it’s no London). We walked around Oxford (the school) looking at all the old pretty buildings and rooms. They're very strict about visitors only allowed to walk certain places, but because Chester is a student, we got mad hook ups, yo.

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Yeah, they filmed Harry Potter here.

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Dead Guy # 2: There's a really old church in Oxford, much like Bath Abby. Once again, lots of dead guys. I can without a doubt have dead people become a theme of my photos.

Bath Abby

Here's me standing in front of a dead guy. Actually, that's a sculpture of a dead guy. The dead guy is under the sculpture. Of the dead guy. Bath Abby was built some time in the fifteenth century, and has literally thousands of corpses burried under the floor. It's like the place is tiled with headstones. One night we were walking past the Abby, and it smelled strongly like moldy marijuana plant drug. I heard later that what we smelled was the stench of a thousand corpses, although I have no idea why you don't smell it most of the time.

There's a really cool sculpture inside, a tomb some general built for his dead wife. It has his wife lying there (life size), and he's lying next to her. He's kinda sitting up, looking concerned and mournful. But his face was all worn away, and he was missing a hand. One of the tour guides informed me that the Abby once tended to sick soldiers during the civil war, and some of the soldiers didn't like this general. It was some complicated thing about how they had recently changed sides, so now this guy was the enemy. So they literally de-faced his statue. Then they cut his right hand off, since that's the one he would hold his sword with. The tour guide said "they wanted to disarm him in another way, but that weapon isn't on the statue!"

A few of the residents of 5 Clarendon Villa, in front of Bath Abby.