Sept 7, 2014

It occurs to me that due to the rambling nature of my thoughts, increasingly, these letters have become less and less about life in Lincs. Some of that is down to the fact that life here is quiet. It’s hard to make ‘nothing going on’ into something interesting. Also, as I travel a fair bit, you’ll hear about those experiences rather than life here - plus, I am constantly engaged by the minutiae of life - politics, the news, documentaries, music - which means you’ll hear about that too.

Some of you comment on the bits of these letters that catch your eye and for that I am grateful. Feedback is always appreciated, whatever direction it takes. A few write back to tell me about your own lives, which is nice for me as I want to know what moves you; what twists and turns visit your life. By the very fact that we have been friends for quite a while now, you shouldn’t be surprised that you are important to me and I want to know what’s happening to you - especially if we haven’t spoken recently.

With that in mind, this letter is about life in Lincs. Let’s start with our roads. They’re not big. We have one motorway, the A1(M) which goes North to South and luckily, the other way too. Most A roads are single carriageway which occasionally feature a bit of dual carriageway every now and then allowing you to get past one or two trucks - so you can queue again behind the ones in front of them. We like to celebrate small victories.

The B roads are Lincolnshire County Council’s traffic calming devices. Straight as you like it’s possible to get up some speed - but they undulate. Consequently, if you do more than 40 you’ll bang your head on the roof before long. We don’t need speed bumps, surprise undulations in the road surface do the job. Speed is for strangers who don’t know the cost of shock absorbers.

In reality, speeding is rare. It does happen but queueing behind a convoy of trucks and tractors interspersed with cars - tends to encourage patience. A few impatient souls will try overtaking five or six cars at a time and where this is successful without a head-on, it just means they queue jump a bit to get in the same queue further up - and life goes on. Realisation will dawn eventually.

With so many farms in this county, there are a lot of tractors using our roads. Slow as they are, oddly-enough, tractor drivers are considerate souls. When there is a straight bit and no traffic in the other lane, they drift to the left, straddling the white line to give you a view of the road ahead. It’s up to you whether you overtake or sit tight. When a bend or a line of traffic approaches, they move back to fill the lane. By blocking your view they are telling you there is nowhere to go. As you see, pace of life is also influenced by driving habits.

It is a simpler life here. I went into Spalding today and found the market place had been taken over by a music festival labelled ‘Music In The Market Place’.

The stage had also been helpfully identified. To add to the air of fiesta, balloons had been deployed. We know how to push the boat out. You soon saw why it had been called Music In The Market Place as a woman was singing and playing a guitar - in the market place, justifying the thought that had gone into the title.

Deckchairs had been laid out for an audience who sat watching, intrigued, applauding politely in the right places - yet offering no clue as to how they would vote at the end. Acts seem to get their fifteen minutes of fame, and the two I saw were deserving of it  being good musicians and singers. Tomorrow the market place will revert to its traditional offerings; handbags and gladrags, fruit & veg, antiques and several forms of cheese. As you see, there’s a bit more to life here than you might surmise.

Being a fruit and veg growing area, there are a lot of Eastern European pickers hereabouts, mainly Poles. When I was a kid, my Uncle Ted (Tadeuzs Balski) a friend of Mum & Dad’s, who I called ‘Uncle’ as he was a generation above, was my footballing mentor. He encouraged me to kick a ball with both feet, taught me how to do keepie uppies and the overhead kick that was not to be seen in British football till Dennis Law brought it back to the U.K. from Italy some eight years later. Uncle Ted was Polish. Following the invasion, he fled Poland to volunteer as a motor cycle despatch rider in the British Army and settled here after the war.

A mate of mine from the Internal Audit days - JR, had a Polish girlfriend called Gina; a lovely lady, a GP who was well mannered, intelligent and articulate. So, I have known two Polish people, both of whom I liked. The love of my life, Aleksandra Mijovic, was a Yugoslav, a Serbo-Croat, studying for two degrees; Business Admin and English Literature. Her dad was a consultant in banking systems who was involved with introducing the VISA credit card process to Sweden (where we met). I met her family and friends in Belgrade and Stockholm, finding them to be civilised people; all-in-all, no complaints.

The few others that I’ve spoken to in and around Spalding, including my dentist, have been quietly-spoken, well-behaved and polite. Consequently, you will not be surprised, from my experience of Eastern Europeans I do not share the Daily Mail’s xenophobic hysteria. Which reminds me… What do you call a person walking to work at 06:30 in the morning? Ans: an immigrant. They’ve got a job - which requires them to be out and about at 06:30 in the morning in all weathers, and - they’re walking to work. How many Brits walk anywhere? Ask any of your cabbie mates. The majority of their fares are people on benefits heading to or from the pub.

Back then in the late 50s, Uncle Ted introduced us to European cuisine such as Salami, Wiener Schnitzel and Pickled Dill Cucumbers - or Wallies as they are better known. Even today, I buy these cucumbers as an adjunct to various meals. Plus we eat them in Big Macs as part of its glorious taste explosion.

All of this is to lead you to my newest fad, Russian Roulette Shopping. With such a large Polish community, we have dedicated Polish food shops featuring quite a bit of their favourite foods - biscuits, cold meats, spices and sauces. A smaller selection is also on the shelves in Sainsbury’s and Morrison’s.

In restaurants, I like to try new things. For the ten years I was on the road with Internal Audit and launching systems with Ford of Europe Accounting, courtesy of Ford, I ate in restaurants around Western Europe from Finland to Italy. It gave me the chance to try local favourites. Gravad Lax, caviar, oysters, Reindeer and Bear steaks (sorry Santa - and fans of Paddington), Squids in ink, Alligator and Turtle being amongst the most memorable. At an Indian, Thai or Chinese, I’ll usually choose something untried - a Chef’s Speciality rather than an old favourite. This is where the Russian Roulette Shopping comes in.

Today in Morrison, this sense of adventure led me to try Almette Zzoolami - from the refrigerated aisles. I have no idea what it is.

 

The name offered no clue but I bought it anyway. I suspect it is a soft cheese in the style of Boursin but this is by no means a given. I’ll let you know shortly.

I like strong tastes and adventures in food, often garnishing meals with a splash or two of Tabasco. My mate JR, mentioned earlier, has a more conservative palate and was of the view that having bought a bottle of tabasco, what with it being the Devil’s condiment and all, you’d use so little that you wouldn’t need to buy another bottle again in your lifetime. He was baffled as to how they stayed in business.

In a previous letter, I mentioned flying with the famous footballer Eusébio. As lunch came round, he reached into his Gucci bag, pulled out a bottle of tabasco and emptied it onto his BA chicken, possibly a bit more freely than most people might be inclined. Each to their own.

So - Almette Zzoolami, let’s see what that turns out to be. More experiments in Polish food to follow. I’ve already tried some of their biscuits which were a cheery, cherry version of Jaffa Cakes - fabulous.

In past letters I have mentioned the fields around these parts. This was the sight that greeted me on my way to the golf club today. I’ve never seen hay stacked in this Close Encounters style before, although, it must be normal as we’ve seen it on the backs of lorries in bales like these, just not in fields. At the height of last year’s floods, on my way to the doc’s in the next village, I witnessed dredging of the ditches. A chap with a JCB was digging out the weed growth in the ditches that separate our roads from our fields.

 

I witnessed this while the Somerset Levels were under water so was pleased to witness local efforts to keep local ditches and dykes clear.

 

JCBs are fine for ditches but something else is needed for rivers and dykes. The golf club has a couple of holes that follow the River Glen. Waiting on the 2^nd tee one day, I watched a couple of boats clearing the weed from the surface and the depths. One was a Proud Mary contraption, with the paddle wheel on the back. He reversed through the weed, then scraped it off the paddles every now and then. The other was a motor boat and a chap with a rake. I hope he got paid more, he seemed to have the tougher job.

This is the Glen, running alongside our course. When you wait on the 2^nd and 4^th tees for the match ahead to get out of range, it provides a welcome diversion but beware its two faces. Having seduced you with its beauty and serenity, when it’s your turn to drive, it becomes a ball magnet. The Delilah that is Nature, eh?

Most of this area is land reclaimed from the sea over a hundred years ago. Spalding was a port once, as was Wisbech, plus I have Holbeach 15 minutes away. The “beach” in their names suggesting previous proximity to the sea. A number of villages in these part have “Seas End” as a suffix to their name - another indication that the sea was once closer. Moulton Seas End is just two miles from me and (now), a lot more than that from the coast.

All those years back, the land was reclaimed by Dutch engineers. It will come as no surprise that my local council is called South Holland District Council. Dutch engineers used their experiences from the Low Countries to design a system of drainage dykes (canals), with raised sides. Now, we have largely flat land, rich, fertile, good for farming - that was once the North Sea or at best marshland. My only complaint is that it has brought the French nearer.

Aug 2014

The summer saw my patio turn into a blaze of colour. Having brought a lot of pots with me from Keysland, I eventually found a few days to put something in them. With winter approaching, today being another sunny day in Paradise, will see many of these transferred to the beds to see if they can survive our winter. I say ‘our winter’ as I’ve noticed that this area is 3º to 5º Celsius colder than you Southern Softies get in Essex (writes Grizzly Adams, Bear-wrestler and Mountain Man).

 Jan 2013

 

Well, that’s more or less life here in Lincs, slow yet varied, simple while also full of surprises like ditch dredging and Music In The Market Place. BTW, the Almette Zzoolami turned out to be a soft cheese that was a bit milder than Boursin, with more gentle chive notes than in-yer-face garlic & herbs - barely poisonous so further excursions into Russian Roulette Shopping will follow.

John King (school friend since we were eight) and Margaret came to visit me and were pleasantly surprised by the sedate pace of life versus the hurly-burly that is Essex. Pete Childs also came for a weekend of golf and to take a look at Spalding. If any of you have a desire to sample this quiet lifestyle, give me a call. We should be able to arrange a few days of (effectively), sleepwalking.