The knot as I blot my paper

Naught, Nought, Not

Many a thought climbs upon a thought,
For which most a duel is frequently fought,
Even if what you desire to write is fraught,
It is a situation in which we all get caught.

Should there be way to escape and be taught,
Then maybe one might soon be on a yacht,
Yet my order of words travelled and bought,
Just as what would get read is highly wrought.

Would mean do the script much as I ought,
That to this very line we can truly be brought,
Where by now the end to a diatribe is sought,
Before a critical review begets an onslaught.

Coronavirus streets at canine trot - LVIII

Beware of dog

Deciding on an early start rather than taking a nap after work, I launched into my walking exercise with the aim of catching up on my daily average, if not for the week, at least for the month. My balaclava face mask worn like a neckerchief to be pulled up when approaching crowds, for the pandemic is not over by a long stretch.

The dusk was closing in quickly, that at 5:00 PM, it was as good as dark and so I needed to reconsider how my route would go. As I came off the second crossing of River Irwell, I took a turn that left me with the foreboding of an unfettered dog barking at the sense of any movement around its territory, but it appeared the dog was already out on walks with its owner that was chatting to their neighbour as passed by, the dog literally ignoring me, I was quite surprised.

Beware of person

Back on my typical route, one pedestrian path had been closed off for road maintenance which left me in an awkward dalliance with danger and car oblivious of other road users. I survived to make it onto Peel Park where I found that quite a few dog owners had attached lights to their dogs so they could be sighted in the dark.

Another two encounters with dogs well-behaved almost had me wondering whether the dogs had been pacified and mollified with substances, only to almost walk into another dog that the owner did not care to control. Meanwhile, the cover of darkness allowed for a dog to foul the undergrowth without having to clean up after their dog.

Beware of plumes

When I came out to the students’ halls of residence, I was accosted for a lighter which would be rather strange as I would have never really expected someone exercising to be a smoker, the lady who asked had me thinking, I stopped flicking a lighter long before you were born. I stopped smoking in 1988.

Back on the macadamised path between River Irwell and Peel Park, I had a second encounter with that control that appeared to be out of control whilst on the leash and now much better behaved when allowed to roam free, you can only wonder whether the temperament is on the owner or the dog.

Beware of fools

My last canine encounter was at New Islington, two dogs with two owners, the leads left loose that they covered the whole pathway such that anyone wanting to go by needed the owners to tug the leads or call the dogs.

Why that is so necessary when it was obvious, they were in a busy area, escapes me, but you have to agree that dogs either imitate the good behaviour of their owners or the owners simply copy the wildness of their potentially housetrained and domesticated dogs, the potential left unexploited from my observation.

It was a good workout and for all the dogs I saw, none barked or growled, it was just a case of the control or absence of the same.

Cape Town reflections: Feathering the nest

But for a love nest

We aim to create home away from home when we meet up in Cape Town that has become our city of choice in South Africa. This requires we have suitable domestic arrangements beyond what obtains in a hotel, and so certain things need to be taken into consideration.

I have used Airbnb once before and, in many ways, I did not enjoy the experience as the upfront costs can be quite high in terms of deposits and I was not sure on the dispute resolution process. With Hotels.com, whilst we cannot make bookings more than 28 nights, there are other benefits as it is part of the larger Expedia Group and for even 10 nights you book, we get an average cost reward night, I have been quite happy with the rewards of almost 9 years of loyalty.

When seeking accommodation, we look for fully-furnished apartments with certain requirements, this demands apartment block information and the apartment inventory are detailed and frequently updated as things do change and sadly, this not always the case. We would rarely book a place where we are not sure of what the apartment contains on the main booking page or in the small print.

Things we note

We can probably trade-off on unlimited Wi-Fi as we have once had to use a Mi-Fi (mobile wireless Internet) when the landlord forgot to keep up with their Internet Service Provider subscription, however, the apartment must have a washing machine, probably with a dryer, a fully kitted kitchen with cooking plates, an oven, a microwave oven, utensils, crockery, cutlery, and other essential elements to make for a homely setting.

Sometimes, the inventory would not suffice and we are left with scrutinising the pictures of the apartment and views from it to see how it is furnished, the general layout, what and where things are installed and gleaning subtle detail as fixed showerheads or those on hoses, the furniture and the bathroom.

On location, Cape Town

Location is obviously important, we try to be within walking distance of the V & A Waterfront, and though we first stayed in the Foreshore area, we have tried out the Gardens, Mouille Point, Green Point and Sea Point. The apartment at the Gardens near the District Six Museum was quite spacious on the second floor, but the area seemed a bit precarious and unsafe, even if it was just 6 blocks up from a main police station. It has a draw, but we have not been persuaded to return.

Obviously, Mouille Point gave us the best views of the sea looking all the way to Robben Island, but the apartment needed some cleaning up before we could move in. The overworked manager who is desperately in need of help but probably too parsimonious to spend on the need to modernise and maintain his portfolio of apartments could do with some aspects of personal hygiene too, our first meeting left me quite crestfallen, I was afraid the last 17 nights of our stay would be in a hovel.

Just to get it right

We lodged our most complaints in a choice of 7 apartments at Sea Point and it was dire. Information on booking page suggested there was no lift in the apartment block and there was. I could have in the absence of a lift for a 3^rd floor accommodation decided on somewhere else. How whoever took the inventory missed the bathtub in the bathroom is totally beyond me.

Then, in the kitchen, there was no microwave oven, like whoever had stayed there before had never spent more than a couple of nights or did not have any inclination to order takeaways or warm meals, surely. Then when trying to cut some kitchen, I found there was no kitchen knife and then we had to go shopping for a knife after 8:00 PM on a Sunday night and we just about got a something slightly longer than a penknife.

The pots were aluminium bowls with handles for the pots or the lids, we needed a laundry basket and a clothesline, we should have asked for a table fan as there was no air-conditioning installed, though there was a gas heater; for Cape Town? I guess I too Northern hemisphere to think winter is Cape Town demands heating.

For convenience always

For our first 28 nights, we were not going to endure the absence of these essential things and it was 6 nights on before we got a useful pot, the microwave oven, a laundry basket and a dozen clothes hangars to supplement the mere 3 in the wardrobes.

When moving to another apartment we have an overlapping day, to check-in the day before we checkout where we are. It gives us time to move apart from allows us to make essential arrangements if necessary. The option to extend always exists, but we have found that for the third time moving apartments during our rendezvous helps give us a feel of the Cape Town and prepare us for our eventual move there.

Cape Town reflections: To the point of embrace

With every hope to do

A time to reflect on my recent journey to Cape Town, for this visit for a rendezvous with Brian had been in consideration from the time I returned in mid-January 2021, but the pandemic with its many waves and Coronavirus variants kept everything at bay.

As the year drew to a close, I had at least two essential things to do before I could plan to travel, my biannual consultation was already scheduled for the last week in October and coming due in the second week of November was my vaccine booster shot after which it looked like there was a clear way ahead to plan for the break.

I planned on a 6-week break and had diligently informed them at work about my plans for which a stand-in was recruited for my time away and this gave me the opportunity on approval to book my holiday from the first week of November and the countdown had begun.

We ploughed ahead regardless

Meanwhile, our daily conversations continued, in the morning and the evening as we planned what we were going to do along with the prospect of getting married. It looked like the whole pall of the pandemic was being put behind us until just in the last week of November, the Omicron variant first sequenced in South Africa though from what transpired was already prevalent around in Europe and the US, led to the putting of southern African countries on the UK red list without even knowing much about the variant.

This could have kiboshed our plans, but I reckoned that since I was going to be away for 6 weeks, enough knowledge and understanding of the variant would have helped put some in reconsideration into the knee-jerk reaction in the Global North. Besides, the whole idea of spending 10 nights in sub-standard quarantine hotels did not appeal to me.

Anyway, I kept my hopes up and continued with my arrangements, renewing my travel insurance, helping my stand-in bed-in, taking my Fitness to Travel PCR Test and I was ready to go. My journey to Cape Town was smooth and in just two legs, the first from Manchester to Paris and the newly reinstated Paris to Cape Town leg, arriving just after 22:28 on the 3^rd of December, but without my baggage in tow.

Bags on a merry-go-round

My baggage did not make the transfer between arriving from Manchester to taking off from Paris, and though we arrived late in Paris, I literally had to rush to the departure gate, the transit time was another 24 minutes longer than the scheduled connection and still, I was not reunited with my baggage until Sunday afternoon. The baggage itself took the Manchester – Paris – Amsterdam – Cape Town route. I should have been given Airmiles for that too.

At first, I thought I would need to stay at an airport hotel overnight because of the pandemic restriction curfew, but that was not an issue, travellers were allowed to make that journey to their accommodations. I had arrived in Cape Town safely and was in Brian’s arms that night, that was all that mattered besides the troublesome issue of my baggage somewhere on the planet.

Men talking helping other men talk

Sharing a private matter

I am just listening to a programme on BBC Radio 4 – Room 5 where I think people talk about life-changing diagnoses of personal consequence. Today, it was about Jon, tall, successful, nice young family and ticking all the boxes. [BBC Radio 4 – Room 5 – Jon]

He was at Peppa Pig World with his family a couple of years ago when he discovered something wrong with his body, secretions from his penis that his GP first treated as a rash or basic infection, then he was referred to a Genitourinary Medicine (GUM) clinic where they determined he did not have a sexually transmitted infection. Now, I already suspected what it might be.

Anyway, after researching online, he found a consultant that diagnosed that he had penile cancer and it had spread to one of the lymph nodes, it was advanced, but also treatable and so they arranged the programme of treatment that has now put the cancer in remission apart from making Jon a totally changed man.

Time to be expressive

I share this story because it has resonance with me in many ways that I have written about before. As men we find it difficult to take about health issues, an irritation in a private place with the accompanying discomfort that we dismiss as trivial even as we are caught up in the embarrassment and tongue-tied when it matters.

Men are dying of conditions that are treatable if caught on time, prostate cancer especially, but also penile cancer and breast cancer, yes, men get it too. We need to cross that barrier that stops us getting help. Only you can properly explain how you feel for a doctor to begin a proper diagnosis or set you on a course of the treatment that would give you that best outcomes, you need to have your voice speaking loud, clear, without fear, shame, or embarrassment.

On sex and sexual organs, the words describing them should not be taboo and move out of the category of profanity. Penis, arse hole, scrotum, balls, buttocks, breast or whatever colloquialism or vernacular gives meaning to what you are referring to need to be words you can use freely in a describing how and what you are feeling as your life might depend on it, it is no time to be coy or shy.

You are going to be touched and prodded in places you have never been touched before or where you have not intended was touchable. Heck! Your life depends on touching the right places to feel and see what is wrong. You can’t play offensive when a situation has made you defensive.

Where my manliness was foolish

In early 2009, I allowed what appeared to be athlete’s foot to develop into a stinking sore half-aware that it might be related to a much earlier HIV diagnosis. That sore turned out to be Kaposi’s sarcoma, a kind of skin cancer and a manifestation in my own case of full-blown AIDS. My condition was that serious that at diagnosis in September of that year, I was given the prognosis that it was treatable if I could tolerate the treatment, else, I had only 5 weeks to live.

The treatment worked because there was a body of knowledge and experience garnered from people and many of whom had not survived that became the canon on which specialists could claim and assert confidence to tackle my condition. I was put on antiretroviral (ARV) drugs that I am still on and seven sessions of chemotherapy over 5 months to put the cancer in remission and reverse AIDS to the point where I have had an undetectable viral load of HIV for over 12 years.

Responsibility and acceptance

I know I contracted HIV through reckless and unsafe sex practices, I have come to terms with the responsibility and consequence of my own actions, however, I do not live in guilt or regret of that, I have a life to live and I intend for whatever time I have left to live it well. In the process, I have learnt to speak freely and liberally especially with medical personnel about how I am feeling, promptly, directly and without mincing words.

However, many diagnoses are not of commission or omission, they are accidents of nature bringing adversity, infirmity and challenges with them. We are left with ourselves and the help we can get to face these situations with the hope that we might surmount them and get to tell a better story.

My voice for my choice

To a team, I once had so say, “It’s my body first, before it is your guinea-pig.”, when I was challenging the determination for intrusive treatment not long after my ordeal with chemotherapy. To another, when I was seeking treatment for another condition, I was blunt about being aware of my mortality as a result of co-morbidities for which immediate action was taken. When I was asked to change to medication that gave me no quality of life, I presented the daily dairy of recorded side effects and contra-indications, and at my request, I was put back on my original drug regime.

I am in my knowledge and understanding as good as my medical notes, if not better. It comes from genuine self-interest and awareness along with the freedom and willingness to talk to address any medical situation I am facing. Then, I encourage the invitation and sitting in of medical students on my consultations, I believe that not only can they learn from my condition, that experience can also go into helping others. I would normally engagement them to appreciate what areas of study and research they want to specialise in.

All the help available

Obviously, for the outcomes I have had, I have to thank the open-minded, professional, considerate doctors in their humanity who have listened, understood, helped, and encouraged me on my path to wellness, their expertise applied with respect and consideration has been lifesaving in so many ways.

To us men, when you feel something, have it checked out and follow the full course with all the advice and help you can get, speak up, speak loudly and if you are not getting the best outcomes possible, challenge the orthodoxy. It is always your body first, before it is anyone’s guinea pig, no matter how good they are at what they do.

Too much wine down the spittoon

Traipsing a new wine trail

Having missed out on understanding the essence of the Garden Route wine trail in not visiting a wine estate, or a distillery as there were many in that area, we decided we’ll do at least tour of wine estates close to Cape Town with the view to doing something different.

We booked a tour on Monday night and had a phone call informing us that our tour guide would be round to pick us up from our apartment at 9:00 AM, we were up and ready well before that time, thinking we were going to join a tour group on a bus, but it soon dawned on us as we drove out of Cape Town that we were on a privately chauffeured tour.

We arrived at Meerlust at 9:30 AM, Felix, our tour guide thinking we were up for wine tasting at that time. I could not countenance the idea of swilling alcohol that early, I come from a good home, we cannot be tasting wine at that time. Even as we saw people walking towards to the tasting rooms, we did a U-turn and continued our journey to other wine estates.

Music for posh wines

De MorgenZon (Established 1699) in Stellenbosch was acquired by the Applebaum’s in 2003 and they have a penchant for playing classical music to the ears if they exist of the grapes to make fine wines, at which point I was rolling my eyes. Apparently, according to Kudzai, the sommelier who conducted the wine tasting at our table, the vibrations from the music help the vines.

When I visited the restrooms, there were music scores on the walls leaving one captivated by both the familiarity and the strangeness of the music. Some new knowledge we gained was that for certain wines, the grapes were pressed with the stems to give that lemon zest taste.

My question was whether this excursion into the musicology of viticulture had made allowances for changes in vintage if the genre were hip-hop, blues, or jazz, for which no research could be provided. However, the vines were on Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart on our visit, the day before, they were given a serving of Antonio Vivaldi, to which I quipped as the weather was changing, if it was The Four Seasons.

A platter to clatter

Next, we arrived at Neil Ellis, a rather modern looking setup where we were told by the Tessa, the sommelier that they mostly buy in their grapes, though they have recently come into possession of a number of vineyards. Then again, this would suggest the wines made here are down to winemaking skills than the end-to-end from planting to bottling or core viticulture.

We availed ourselves of the platters of cheese, Parma ham and somewhat bland melon, but of the wines we tried, we came, we saw, we drank, we left. Nothing more to be said than the evident prospect of no return. Thank you.

At Haute Cabrière (Established 1694) in Franschhoek, by Pierre Jourdan for whom their Methode Cap Classique wines are named. Bongile, the sommelier, whose name attracted a twisting fate of mispronunciation, was helpfully at hand to explain as we took in the amazing mountain views from the tasting room. The bubbles go to my head.

Down a snake-winding staircase to the view of a cellar of barrels in a temperature-controlled room. To the right, the gents with urinal bowls full of ice cubes that creaked to the heat of your urination. Dare I say that might have been the highlight of my visit to this wine estate. We cannot for the snobbery of wine accept as good what our taste does not perceive, regardless of the medals earned from wherever.

Just at the very last

We invited Felix to have a late lunch with us in Franschhoek before visiting the last wine estate on our itinerary, Rickety Bridge (Established 1797) which for all its old money looks as part of an old estate La Provence now had such avant-garde names for their wines as Printer’s Devil from a few decades ago. In my own opinion, the range of wines were without character, though almost with distinction in aroma and definitely not in taste.

On being asked about my assessment after tasting 4 wines, I suggested they were a bit arboreal, a word our sommelier whose name I cannot recollect might not have understood, having not been provided with a spittoon, we had poured it all down the roots of a tree by our table.

The fifth wine had desperate attempts at effecting character but coming short in defining itself, that it verged on the quite truly forgettable. She returned with a Pinotage that did go down well, the first glass of about 25 wines that I had tasted in the day that I drank all up. Much as I sympathise with the winemakers along with the art, craft, and expertise involved in making their wines, to the individual, it is down to taste, palate, and comfort, one man’s poison is another man’s elixir. C’est la vie.

Coronavirus streets in Cape Town - LVII

The cruise to amuse

At just before 6:00 AM this morning, I looked out of my window to see a cruise liner passing to the right in the bay ahead, and just as I thought it was going to dock it turned around and cruised back out of the bay, this apparent circling in the bay continued for a few hours as I took out my binoculars to view what might be going on. It transpired that the wind which we did not particularly feel as close to the beach as we were made it unsuitable for a docking manoeuvre.

Then just before noon, it appeared to disappear close to the V&A Waterfront and soon we found that she had docked at the cruise terminal. We returned from Wynberg to the waterfront curious to find out about the cruise liner we had already determined was the MSC Orchestra.

A view to a queue

At the cruise terminal, we found ourselves channelling Chaka Khan with two lines from one of her hit songs, paraphrased, as one is wont to play at.

I feel for you,
You’re in a long queue.

The queue of passengers waiting to board was quite literally interminably long even without the social distancing and we supposed it was exacerbated by the need for rapid testing before boarding as cruise liners have been unmitigated incubators of the Coronavirus and communal spreading is most definitely encouraged by the community and confinement in closed spaces of a cruise liner regardless of how luxurious it is.

Yet, this portends a change in activities that suggest either moving beyond or living with the pandemic. The surprise for me was that I did not realise there was a proclivity for cruises amongst South Africans, the majority therein being the nominal majority of the country. I am gladdened by this because this might be the year of exiting the strictures of the pandemic, with wider and easier opportunities for travel and much else.

MSC Orchestra this morning, coming into the bay.

MSC Orchestra circling out of the bay.

MSC Orchestra, up close at the cruise terminal.

MSC Orchestra, at the cruise terminal.