At the hop
Graham Spence
About twice a year we get to see how the other half lives.
This involves an invite to a party from a couple who for some reason think we contribute to the more off-beat edge of their guest list.
The wife, who is magnificent, usually introduces me to some gazillionaire by saying I wrote a book about Afghanistan. (I've given up correcting her that I was only the co-author and it was about Iraq).
Management first met them when she got a job 'temping' as a receptionist with a digital gadget company soon after we arrived in England.
The boss' PA took a shine to her and introduced her to the boss' wife, who did ditto.
What the boss thought when he came home one evening and saw his receptionist slouched in his sitting room slugging bubbly French stuff with his wife and PA is not on record.
However, whenever he sees us, he asks how Africa is, as if we've just stepped off the plane at Heathrow.
The fact that he blithely assumes we fly 10 000km for one of his parties shows the calibre of his invitees.
Anyway, this was a 'decade busters' fancy dress bash and you had to come decked out in something fashionable from yesteryear.
What decade the boss had in mind garbed as a decadent German baron, I do not know.
In contrast, I looked positively banal in jeans and T-shirt claiming I was a '60s rock star, particularly as I had worn the same outfit to their last party, which was not fancy dress.
As we entered, a barman with an accent thrust flutes of champagne at us and pointed to 'zee oyster bar'.
A moment later management was face down in a shell the size of a Frisbee slurping fishy globules swimming in Guinness.
There must have been about 100 people, all swigging bubbly and swaying to music from the first of two bands booked for the night.
Queen of everything
As I edged through the crowd, a woman dressed as Her Majesty swanned past with a big-jewelled crown and a sign around her neck stating she was 'Queen of (bleeping) everything'.
'That's Jodie,' whispered management, 'she's married to the owner of a fleet of cruise liners.'
The cruiser was with her, smoking a smelly cigarillo in a long-tapered holder.
He looked as ancient as Onassis and no doubt Jodie was a trophy wife.
In fact, management whispered, he had to fly her to out to Australia every summer as she didn't 'do' English winters.
As if sensing we were talking about her, Jodie sauntered over and we all did extravagant air kisses.
Management then asked if Jodie still had her horse in India.
This elicited moist eyes; said horse had recently died.
Apparently Jodie likes riding, but not in cramped England. So she stabled her animal in India, doing an annual riding safari in Rajasthan – 'Maharajah country dahling' – prior, of course, to said steed's demise.
She then asked if I had been to India, expressing disbelief when I answered to the contrary.
I think we're the only people she'd met who hadn't.
All the while waiters dressed as pirates and waitresses dressed as wenches served trays of snacks, none of which I recognised.
Suffice it to say that fish eggs from Russia were heaped on most of them.
Our hostesses then interrupted Jodie's equestrian adventures to tell us the belly-dancing act was on.
I expected to see some enthusiastic housewives doing a skit, but no, this was the real thing.
Piped Arabian music did justice to yowling cats as silk-veiled maidens showed how supple a belly can be if you don't, like me, use it for beer storage. Then dinner was served; a choice of either seared Pacific tuna or blood-rare steak, imported from Argentine, natch.
After that fire-eaters pranced around the swimming pool.
I must confess watching men in tights swallowing flaming swords straight after dinner was a little dodgy on my digestion.
However, by then the party was in full throttle. We left sometime in the morning – management dragging me off just as I was about to brag to the cruise line owner about a skiboat I once had in Africa.
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