Nov 2017 – The Irish Rover

Bertie Law

Since my mother died in 1985 and my father in 1995, my visits to my homeland have been few and far between; Portrush is about as far from NW Europe as one can go.

In the spring of 2005, I drove over to Ulster, via Stranraer and the ferry to Larne, to spend some time in the archives in Belfast; I wanted to research part of my Irish family history. And afterwards, for two glorious days I went walking in the Mourne mountains.

An abandoned ice-house on the lower slopes of Sleive Donard, in the Mourne mountains

Instead of returning directly to Larne and Stranraer, as I had intended, I decided to take a detour north to Portrush and around the stunning coastal road. Almost without exception, when I have returned to Portrush, my first stop has been the graveyard of the ruined church at Ballywillan. For in that graveyard are buried my Douglas ancestors, as far back as the early 1700s. My parents and paternal grandparents are also buried there and for a while I wander from one known grave to another, lost in memories of when many of them were alive, especially in the case of my first schoolmaster (see Jimmy) and Derek Aiken, a school friend, who died at age 44.

Existimos mientras alguien nos recuerde

(We exist while someone remembers us)

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Further down the hill, was the grave of Molly, the wife of my first cousin, Bertie Law. After leaving the graveyard, I intended on passing by his house in the hope of spending some time with him. I had just found new data on ancestors in which I knew he would be most interested, for like me, he was an enthusiastic amateur genealogist.

But when I arrived at Molly’s grave I was momentarily confused; she had been dead for thirteen years, yet the soil had still not settled. And then of course it dawned on me that Bertie was dead, and only very recently buried.

Bertie’s mother, Annie, was my grandfather’s sister. She died three days after giving birth to Bertie’s younger brother, John, commonly known as Jackie. Twenty years later, Sergeant John Douglas Law of the R.A.F. died over Germany and is buried at Rheinburg War Cemetery. I believe Jackie to have been the only WW2 casualty of the village.

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Bertie was my mother’s first cousin and the most complete example of a handyman that I have ever known. He was an accomplished carpenter, bricklayer, plasterer, roofer and decorator. He built his own house in Glenmanus and most of the buildings on my father’s farm: the housing for the incubators, chicks, poultry, turkeys, the pig pens, and all of the storehouses. And when my mother was on one of her ‘I’d like to change this room’ moods, Bertie would construct cupboards and partitions. It was through observing Bertie at work, that when the need arose, I knew instinctively how to lay bricks, plaster, rebuild a shower, decorate etc.

Bertie was something of a workaholic. During the day he worked as a conductor for the local bus company and later he would work on the farm buildings. And when he returned home, he would spend time in the evening in his extensive vegetable and flower garden.

It was after the death of my father that I discovered Bertie’s interest in family history. He showed me the charts that he had drawn and we ended up by combining our research. And we supplemented it by mail, by telephone and occasional visits by me. Bertie’s charts are the backbone of what I know today of the history of the Douglas family of Glenmanus.

I felt very sad that day in May when I eventually left the graveyard. It felt like the end of an era, for Bertie was my last close contact with my parents. I still have two cousins living in the village, Hughie and Brian Douglas. I have recently renewed contact with them and long may that contact last.

Sometimes I feel most fortunate, for I am rich in memories.

Fragolina

I first arrived in Montevideo on 1 December 2013 and Lotta joined me a few days later. Within another week we moved into a small serviced apartment in nearby Pocitos, a beach suburb of Montevideo. And for three southern summers that apartment was our home.

It was not much of a challenge to feel at home in Pocitos. Within a short time, the doormen of the neighbouring buildings would greet us, together with the parking attendants and the armed guards outside the banks. On La Rambla, we quickly progressed from nodding acquaintance with the locals and their dogs, to greetings and conversation. After I had been to an excellent barber (Charles Oribe – Caballeros MVD) and Lotta had found a superb beauty parlour (Mariana Bello Peluqueria & Estética), we could not pass their premises without their waving to us. It was the same recognition and welcome that we received in the bars, restaurants and supermarkets that we frequented. And one of the parking attendants used to sing ‘You are my sunshine’, when Lotta passed him on her early morning run. We felt quite at home.

When we returned for the second year, we wondered if we would be remembered. We need not have been concerned, for greetings transformed into hugs and embraces. We were now really part of the local scene and it felt so good.

Outside a brand-new building in the next block to our apartment, there was a small chalk-board on the pavement advertising daily specials for a new restaurant, Fragolina. The restaurant was part of the large central lobby, with a small shopping complex, and had not been long opened. It was lunchtime, so we entered and ordered a meal and found the food to be excellent and plentiful. As soon as we finished eating, the chef came out of the kitchen, greeted us warmly and wanted to ensure that everything was to our satisfaction. That was our first introduction to Gaston Garrassini and his immaculate attention to detail.

We returned to Fragolina at least a couple of times every week that we were in Pocitos. We never failed to feel honoured and warmly welcomed by Gaston and his staff. When we left in April 2016, there was Cecilia, Belén, Anna and Romina. And of course Gaston’s father, who used to sit at the bar or at an empty table, reading a newspaper, or working on his laptop, until there was a home delivery for him to take care of.

10515279_567869853358487_7663300087972166368_o — Fragolina during the day (photo from Fragolina)

10714403_567763000035839_7767171967915618973_o — And during the evening (photo from Fragolina)

22491755_10213222325209221_1209643149558663522_n — Gaston Garrassini, *chef extraordinaire*, and his speciality, a gigantic paella (photo from Fragolina)

Every morning Gaston goes to the market to select the best quality meat, fish, vegetables and fruits. And he never seems to follow a standard recipe, for each dish has a touch of his improvisation. One cannot please all the people all the time, but I suspect that there are very few who leave unimpressed with Fragolina and its staff.

21150063_1200332073445592_6556575180428919641_n — A typical potato and cheese dish, with a sprinkling of bacon bits and parsley – my kind of food (photo from Fragolina)

21034737_1197823563696443_941500273040558318_n — Or a lasagna, large enough for two (photo from Fragolina)

21078798_1198628386949294_2795978673661707330_n — And a typical ‘Gaston’ hamburger with the trimmings and chipped potatoes (photo from Fragolina)

These days we are based in Cape Town and have not been back to Pocitos since 2016. But we follow Fragolina on Facebook (see here), and the business seems to be going from strength to strength. We often look at their daily menu, and wherever we are, we say – ‘Why don’t we have lunch today at Fragolina?’

One of these days, perhaps soon, we will return.

Galapagos Duck

For me, Sydney in the years 1971 to 1976 was idyllic. I had left behind the cold damp climate of Ireland to find myself facing the long freezing winters of Toronto. After five years of purgatory, I decided that enough was enough and the lure of the South Pacific won me over. I escaped and I have never regretted that move.

For one sight of the piercing blue sky, the profusion of bougainville, the immense drowned-valley harbour, with its ferrys scuttling from point to point, and the string of beaches and headlands up and down the coast was enough; I fell head and heels in love with the country.

And I was living in Kirribilli the night of October 20, 1973, when the Opera House was officially opened, and the sky exploded with a magnificent display of pyrotechnics. Life felt really felt good.

Opera_House_and_ferry._Sydney — Sydney Opera House as seen from Kirribilli

download — And at sunset, with the harbour bridge in the background

For my first two years in Sydney, I was employed as a computer programmer with Nestlé, at their offices on Foveaux Street, close to Central Station. They were good employers and I was relieved to have a steady income; when I received my first salary, my account was empty. And it was there that I met Philip Cockell, with whom I am still in contact.

Soon after I joined Nestlé, I was recruited into the football team, that participated in a local works league. Our home ground was a pitch beside the Nestlé factory, and when we were downwind, the smell of chocolate was quite overpowering. We got quite accustomed to that smell, but visiting teams usually visibly suffered: having a home game was definitely an advantage.

But I was ambitious in those days – I guess that I still am – and a plodding existence in Nestlé was not for me. In 1973, I was offered a similar position in a local computer services company – IDAPS Computer Sciences, and I made the move. And after a few months I was promoted to manage their small group of programmers.

It was in the early days of service bureaus and few companies could afford their own computers. Our clients would deliver their data on paper at the end of the business day and our key-punch operators would convert it to card or paper tape. The data would then be loaded on our mainframes, processed, print reports produced and delivered to the clients, in time for the start of the next business day.

During normal hours the programmers worked on new developments or enhancements to existing systems, and at night we provided on-call support, in case of production failure. As I lived close to the office I handled most of the on-call support, and there were few weeks when I did not get called in at least once to sort out a program bug or operator error. It was after one such late night that I stumbled upon The Basement jazz club.

The Basement was located in the basement (where else?) of a nondescript building close to Circular Quay, not far from my office. In those days meals were served from early evening and live jazz from nine o’clock to the wee hours of the morning. The food was good and the house wine inexpensive and I soon found myself going there regularly, usually alone during a weeknight, sometimes with friends at weekends.

The Basement opened in 1973 with a relatively unknown modern jazz group called Galapagos Duck. And later on, most nights they would be joined by other jazz musicians and a jam session would get going. I used to love to sit there at a secluded table, sipping on a bottle of wine and letting my mind wander.

Galapagos Duck performed continuously at The Basement for 16 years and to this day still appear there from time to time. They made their first album – Ebony Quill – in 1974, and I still have a copy.

Sometimes when on my own and in a nostalgic mood, I turn the lights down and the volume up, and with my glass of wine at hand, ‘Ebony Quill’ takes me back in time to a late night in Sydney.

Listen with me to one of the tracks…

Voltaire

‘J’ai décidé d’être heureux, parce que c’est bon pour la santé’ (Voltaire)

For most of eight years, 1999-2007, I had a small mezzanine apartment in Paris at 24 Rue de Lille, one short block removed from the left bank, opposite the Louvre. It was a perfect location for me; a short walk to the metro at Rue du Bac and two minutes from the river, in the historic heart of the city. Over the years, I read many historical novels set in the area, and often I would walk the streets of the old city in the late evening, trying to envisage what it must have been like in past centuries.

I have never aspired to cook, other than to boil an egg, make a coffee, open a beer or a bottle of wine. When it comes to preparing a meal, I defer to those who are more expert than I. Over time, I ate at most of the restaurants and bistros within a ten-minute walk from my apartment, but the one that I most frequented was La Frégate, on the corner of Rue du Bac and Quai Voltaire, at the Pont Royal. There were very few weeks when I did not eat there at least once, and I soon became recognized as a local client, as distinct from one of the many tourists. But despite the earnest efforts of the maitre d’, Patrick, to introduce me to more exotic French cooking, it was rare that I deviated from my omelette au fromage or salade mixte. But Patrick and I had one passion in common – rugby, and we had many animated conversations about the prospects of the French and Irish teams, especially during the annual 6-nations competition.

Paris-La-Fregate-cafe-2 — La Frégate (photo from internet)

To walk from my apartment to La Frégate, indeed to get to the river, I almost always walked down the last block of the Rue de Beaune. And there on the corner was the house in which Voltaire died, in 1778, as recorded on a plaque on the wall.

Voltaire-last-house — Where Voltaire died (photo from internet)

Voltaire was his pen-name. In real life he was François-Marie Arouet, born in 1694. He was a profligate writer of plays, books, essays, letters; the criticism of organised religions was a frequent theme in his writing. He wrote more than 50 plays, dozens of essays on science, politics and philosophy, several books on history and more than twenty thousand letters to friends and contemporaries. And yet, he is seldom read today.

When he was younger, he became wealthy, by exploiting a flaw in the French lottery, together with a syndicate of gamblers. His resulting wealth allowed him to be independent and able to pursue his academic interests.

Voltaire was reputed to work up to eighteen hours day and often fueled his energies with more that forty cups of coffee a day. He spent part of his life in prison, at one time in the Bastille, or in exile, and lived for most of his later life in Geneva. He was also an entrepreneur, setting up a successful watch business in Switzerland.

He never married nor had children, despite many relationships. On his death bed, he is reputed to have told the priests – ‘Let me die in peace’.

bra07058 — Portrait de Voltaire (Francois Marie Arouet dit, 1694-1778) tenant l’annee litteraire. Peinture de Jacques-Augustin-Catherine Pajou (1766-1828), 18eme siecle. Paris, Comedie Francaise

There are many buildings in central Paris with plaques recording their previous inhabitants. Like that of Voltaire, there are so many fascinating histories to be discovered. At one time, I aspired to document many of the plaques and to write a short historical summary of the lives of each subject.

It is not yet too late…