Monthly Archives: March 2008

The Tac-alarm rouses us again and we roll ourselves out of bed. Having done the “history” side of Durham yesterday, K deems today Shopping day. There’s just so many to explore.

We hit Saddlers to fuel ourselves up for the day ahead and then wander up to the Cathedral to get a peek at the bits we missed yesterday, including the absurdly well-stocked gift shop, with all the usual selections of rubbers, pencils, notebooks and such like, but also the most amazing selection of miniature sculptures and jewelery. It’s all I can do to resist putting the entire shop on my credit card (minus the rubbers – not so bothered about those).

From the Cathedral (after a quick re-fuel in the coffee shop – that’s how long we were there for…) we head out on our pilgrimage through the land of the knick-knack shops and obscenely expensive clothing and jewelery stores. Not only is Durham the most beautiful city, but it has the most wonderful selection of shops and boutiques I’ve ever seen in one place. From your regular, everyday staples like BHS, Marks and Sparks, Top Man and the like, they run the gamut right down to the tiniest of independent bookstores, somehow holding their own against the gargantuan chains of Waterstones and Smiths.

Hours and hours later (I think) we finally succumb to needing a proper rest and head back to the college for a wee kip and 40 winks (we’re in need of both), after which we ready ourselves for a quiet night together in the centre.

We head to the Market Tavern, a recommendation from Pops and co, which turns out to be pretty disappointing. Cracking Nachos to start with, but the burgers are lacklustre and tasteless and definitely not worth the price I fork over at the bar.

Rather than stopping in there for another pint, we take ourselves off to Varsity again, this time making use of my complimentary V-card membership thrown in with my goodie bag at the fashion show last night. K, unfortunately, doesn’t have one and so has to pay for entry, but gets herself a card in the process, which leads us to the bar at which we discover that everything behind it is £1 – pints and spirits – and once again hail the wonder of the student town.

Pops is supposed to be catching us up this evening after an event she’s been summoned to, but unfortunately it drags on and on and she never makes it. We cope fine in the big wide world by ourselves, though, and instead sit and enjoy the sight of foolhardy students partaking in the Lumley Run.

For the uninitiated among you (as we were until we questioned the Gentleman holding a pint to one side of an enormous pool of vomit in the street), the Lumley run is a 7 mile run undertaken by mostly Freshers from Lumley Castle (no idea if I’ve spelled that right) to Durham Castle on the top of the hill. So far so regular. On the run from Lumley to Castle, however, there are 23 pubs and at those 23 pubs a total of 11 pints to be consumed in various guises, all of which must take up the least possible amount of time, as the first man home wins himself a membership to an exclusive Gentlemen’s club in London.

By the time the participants arrived at the Shakespeare (where we first learned of their fate), they are essentially almost home and so exhausted that their body simply rejects whatever they put into it, hence the rather attractive floor decoration we encountered. From our seats in the window of Varsity, we are occasionally greet with the tail-enders hauling themselves up the final hill, “encouraged” by a veteran of the run who, judging by their relative buoyancy, have been spared the necessary lubrication on the way round the course.

Once the entertainment has passed and we’ve made the most of the drinks offers (well, I managed a pint, but you can’t go living too crazily, booze-wise, post-transplant), we call it a night and walk ourselves home (see Bill – we can do it!) to a relatively early bed. Tomorrow is a long drive, plus we have to be out of the room by 10, which is normally when we’re thinking about waking up!

I wake to my Tac-alarm (the 10am call that stirs me every morning I’m not up in time for my morning dose of Tacrolimus, my main immunosuppressant) and sit and read for a while as K comes to.  Once we’ve rolled out of bed and managed to get some clothes on, we hop in the car and run ourselves into town.  The walk along the river yesterday was great, but knowing we’re going to be exploring all over the hills of Durham today, we opt to take the car in to the centre so the journey home is easier if we’re exhausted by the end of the day.

We park up in their multi-storey by the Elphick Bridge and wander out through their “shopping centre”.  I use inverted commas because it’s not so much a shopping centre as a centralised collection of shops in a U-shape off a parking structure.  Given the olde worlde nature of the rest of the city, the cul-de-sac of high-street shops is somewhat incongruous, but we let it slip past us as we wander off and up the Bailey in search of breakfast, which we find not halfway up the street in the shape of Saddler’s, a small-but-perfectly-formed little cafe which does breakfast till 12 (we make it by 15 minutes) and other luxury items throughout the day.

Having charged ourselves for the day ahead, we continue up the Bailey towards the Palace green and the Cathedral which towers over the whole of the centre of Durham.  I pull out the camera to snap some pics as we approach only to discover I’ve forgotten to charge the battery.  I swear at myself a lot.  Mostly under my breath, although a couple of passing pigeons may have heard a little bit of blue-air in passing, for which I profusely apologise.   What makes it more galling is the fact that the weather forecast for the next few days is terrible, including snow storms tomorrow.  As we walk up to the Cathedral, with the castle bearing down on us from behind, the skies are a crystal-clear blue with barely a smattering of clouds, the city bathed in a warm Spring glow which fails to dissipate through the day.  I’m furious with myself for missing the best part of the weekend to snap decent pics of one of my new favourite homeland locations.

After an interval that would seem short for even the most temperamental five-year old, I clear out of my funk as we enter the cathedral.  It’s magnificence defies even my power of description.  I’m relieved to see all the signs telling me photography is forbidden, making me mildly less frustrated, but am soon distracted by all the point-and-wonder beauty of the inside of the building.  From the windows to the pillars, ever inch of the cathedral is steeped in over 1000 years of history.  The cathedral itself used to provide a respite for fugitives and law-breakers.  With a single knock on the great door, they would be admitted for safe harbour, given 30 days to sort out their affairs or leave the country through the nearest port.

The main hall of the cathedral is adjoined by a cloistered area and a dozen or so more rooms which afford the place ample space for coffee-shops, souvenirs and all the additional gubbins of a modern-day historical site whilst still allowing it to go about it’s regular daily business as a place of worship.

We eventually decide that it’s too much for us to take in after a big walk and with feet starting to ache, so we adjourn for the day to lower climbs down at the bottom of the hill over the bridge where we settle in for lunch at the Swan and 3 Cygnets, a pub which doesn’t end up providing the rustic-pub-grub that we had been hoping for, but it’s decent enough sustenance all the same.

While we eat, we talk to Pops, who’s calling it quits on her day’s work and heading down to meet us, nothing at all to do with the cafe opposite the pub having, “the best cake in Durham” (a direct quote from the text message).  She and her other half wander down and we head over the road to the Cafe Continental and seclude ourselves away in their uppermost room, where the two of them have lunch while K joins them in dessert.  I restrict myself a mediocre milkshake, but I’m assured by all and sundry that the cakes are, indeed, magical.

Totally failing in our planned return to the college to catch some Z’s before the later afternoon’s programme of events, we instead end up sitting and whiling away most of the afternoon in the cafe with Pops and Alex, covering as many conversational bases as it’s possible to cover without slipping into a brain-frying tangential spiral more akin to Eddie Izzard.  Mind you, we still manage to fit in a good few tangents all the same.

We head back to the college, paying our extortionate parking charges on the way, and grab a quick feet-up 20 minutes before we head back up to Castle for the afternoon’s main attraction, the Big Chill With Bill – an opportunity for the Durham students to come and meet their Chancellor that surprisingly few of them take up.  I’m not too disappointed though, as the group who do arrive mean the afternoon is passes in an intimate chat about organ donation and the amazing gift of life – both Pops and I relaying our various personal stories of transplant (her brother being a heart-recipient 2 years ago), with interjections from various people in the group to ask questions or find out what more they can do to help.  In any of the talks of events I do, however formal or informal, I always feel that if one person goes away and talks to someone else, or signs someone up to the ODR, then it’s been a worthwhile use of my time and that’s exactly how I feel as K and I walk away from the Castle to shoot back to the college to change for the main event of the evening.

The Hatfield College Charity Fashion show is an annual event that is run entirely by students (as the Master of the College’s wife was so keen to inform us).  Having never been to a fashion show before, I have no idea what to expect, but manage to take the majority of it in my stride.  Sitting on top table as guests of honour (well, of the Chancellor, anyway), we are afforded one of the best views in the house, which is only a little uncomfortable when watching the La Senza section as the barely-out-of-their-teens models (my God, I sound old) parade themselves mere inches from their Chancellor’s face.  I’ve no idea what he’s thinking, but I don’t know where to look, so take to alternately bitching with Pops and K, sitting either side of me.

The main highlight of the evening (apart from a 3-item attempt at an auction, which included dinner with one of the male models) is the group photo after the fact with all the models in My Friend Oli t-shirts, myself and Bill.  Promotion/attention seeking as I am, I have high hopes that the free t-shirts will be worn and talked about all over Durham and the photos will find their way into as many student publications as  Alice and Pops can persuade.

Torn between wanting to experience a night out in Durham and the fact that we haven’t managed the rest we needed during the day, K and I finally decide we don’t want to push it too far, so after saying our farewells to Bill, who will from here on out be detained on Uni duties and too busy for the campaign (we have spent our allotted day of his time, which is more closely guarded than many a club door on a Saturday night) , we head back to the college to crash out, which we do by 11pm. 

First fact of the weekend – Durham is far.  Not far like as in quite a long way from MK, I mean far as in get-up-early, leave-before-lunch, drive-for-ages, double-stop and still only just get there before nightfall.

So get up early(ish) we do, drag our butts out of bed and K breakfasts while I repack all my useless packing from the night before into a better case which, I hope, will be easier to handle.  We set off by 10, making a quick stop off at Parental Lewingtons to say Hi and drop off the Mother’s Day gift and card for the day we’ll sadly be missing out on tomorrow.  Part of me feels terrible for not being around to share it with my wonderful mother, but I know that actually, what will make her happier than anything is knowing that I’m able to be off gallivanting and enjoying myself at the other end of the country.  And a nice pair of earrings doesn’t hurt, either.

We’re off and away onto the M1 by 11 and start the trek to the North.  And then a bit further.  One of the dispiriting things about heading that far North, as I have previously to Newcastle, a mere pebble-chuck from Durham, is that you travel for ages on the M1 and eventually get passed Sheffield to Leeds and you realise that you’ve still got as far to go again to get to where you want to be.  Still, it could be worse – we could have paid £360 for the both of us to do the 5-hour train journey instead.

Along the way we rock the iPod, whiling away the miles listening to a track-listing of the machine’s choice, occasionally edited by the passenger-seat DJ.  We finally roll into Durham off the A1(M) at somewhere around 4 o’clock and amazingly find our accommodation within 10 minutes after only a single phone-call to our Castle-based “fixer” the ever-attentive Pops, doyen of the My Friend Oli campaign.

The room is a spacious twin guest room in the college of St Hilde and St Bede.  I’ve no idea who they are, but as Saints go, they have a good line in comfy sleeping-quarters and nice, deep baths.  No sooner are we in than I hit the sack to crash out for an hour, before we venture up into town to meet Pops and her little (although really rather tall) bro.

The walk from the college into town gives us our first visual impression of the city of Durham and as first impressions go, it’s hard to imagine a better one.  With light shimmering off the river as we wander along the towpath, we pass the hardy-yet-incredibly-foolish rowers packing up into the rowing club, then round the corner to get our first sight of the Cathedral and Castle atop the hill in the centre of town.  With the Elvet Bridge mirroring itself in the inky blackness of the river, the scene is as close to mesmerizingly seductive as it’s possible for the still life of a city to be.

After climbing the biggest set of stairs we were to encounter all week (and encounter them fairly darn often, too), we manage to bump into Pops and bro on the bridge itself.  It’s the first time since the campaign kicked off that I’ve actually met Pops, despite numerous conversations by phone, email and good ol’ reliable Facebook.  Not surprisingly, what with this being a student town and Pops being a resident hard-core studenty-type, the first thing we do is settle in the nearest  bar.  This is where I fell in love with Durham head-over-heels – where else but a student town could you pick up a round of drinks consisting of a pint of Guiness, a half of Kroenenburg, a double-Gin and lemonade and a coke for under a tenner?  Certainly not in any of the bars in MK.

After an interval of one-and-a-half rounds (don’t worry, I was on Coke), we are joined by Pops’ just-arrived, former-native other half.  No sooner had the longed-for-loved-one turned up than Pops abandons us to make her final prep for tonights’s closing night of Assassins, the Sondheim musical she’s MD’ing, in amongst all her work on My Friend Oli, plus uni work, plus Oli-sitting duties for the weekend.

After the most rushed meal I’ve eaten in a long time (which came back to haunt me later, but that’s another story all together), the four reprobates she left in the pub stumble/run/lurch our way up the Bailey just in time to slide apologetically into our seats having delayed the start of the show with our tardiness.  Well, I like to think we were important enough to delay the start of the show, but then again it was probably more likely to be problems tying John Wilkes Booth’s cravat than anything to do with up.

I’ve not seen Assassins before and I was pleasantly surprised – I often struggle with the first viewings of Sondheim shows, even if they do grow on me with time.  Although there were a fair share of technical problems with radio mics and odd-lighting (largely due to the awkward nature of the venue, it must be added, rather than any ineptitude on the part of the production team), it was an impressive show, especially considering the speed with which it was put together and the work-load the cast have to carry outside of the Theatrical realm.

The show also marked the first time in 2 years I’ve seen the ever-marvellous and always Gentlemanly Bill Bryson, Chancellor of Durham Uni, world-renowned author and – let’s not forget – instigator of the whole My Friend Oli campaign, following our first meeting and subsequent phone chats since.  It’s great to see him again and spend a bit of time catching up on our news.  Well, I say “our” but in reality, the first evening is spent almost entirely and exclusively talking about me and my op, many of the details of which Bill had yet to be appraised of.

After the show, K and I decide to judiciously step aside and let the cast and crew make the most of their last night party without forcing Pops and the rest of the My Friend Oli gang (the ever-organised events-queen Alice) to feel the need to nanny us through the night and thus not really take part in all the usual shenanigans that one should at the close of a production.

Being the impossibly nice person he is (seriously, you have to see it to believe it), Bill insists on walking us the 20 minutes back to our lodgings along the riverside before heading back to exactly where he’d just been to catch his own cab back to his residence.

Bushed from the day’s driving and the night’s exertions (not least the hills of Durham), we are both in bed by 10.30 and I’m fairly sure I’m asleep by 10.31.  But I’m already dreaming of living in Durham.