Diaries 1969-1979_ The Python Years - Michael Palin [306]
Couldn’t really face the empty rooms of the suite – with traces of breakfast and freshly-crumpled beds – so I walked along the beach, then played my tennis match with John C. Playing solidly rather than cleverly I rattled him enough to take the first set 6–2. Great elation. But I relaxed and the wind began to strengthen (favouring the technically proficient player who could control his shots), John recovered his confidence and began to play me solidly, if not spectacularly, off the court.
Then Terry J dropped by – we drank a beer each then went into Sousse for Sunday lunch at the Lido. As cheerful and restorative to the spirits as ever. Body and soul brought together with grilled prawns and sole and perch and goat’s cheese, washed down with Tunisia’s best white wine – Domaine de Karim. We sat next to two Tunisian couples who work on the film, who insisted on sharing various of their dishes with us, giving us a taste of harrissa (the hot sauce), pomegranate, and showing us how to eat dates with butter.
After a leisurely lunch, we walked out onto the quay where two or three Russian cargo boats were unloading (Sunday being a half working day here), feeling all was very well with the world. Walked up through the narrow streets of the souk – the smell of leather mingling with the sweet aroma of the many confectionery stalls. Watched a cow’s head being skinned and cut up in a butcher’s – you’d never see that in England – past kids playing football (very well) and men hammering patterns onto brass plates for the tourists. Took mint tea in a café, then back to the docks. Decide that I feel safer in cities with the sea on one side …
I’ve just placed a call to London to see if they’ve arrived. Six thirty-five, they have … It’s raining in London. Feel a bond with them as I listen to the angry windswept sea in the darkness outside.
Monday, October 23rd, Monastir
Walking on the beach after breakfast I frame an idea for a Ripping Yarn – ‘Golden Gordon’, a soccer tale. It feels good, as the surge to write returns after all these weeks. I sit at a table in the sunshine and scribble away for a couple of hours. Then, having reached an impasse, lie in the sun by the pool and read through ‘Whinfrey’ to get a timing on it.
Eric and Tania – buoyant – join me and we have lunch together. Eric reads in the Daily Express that Nelson’s last words were in fact ‘Don’t throw me overboard, Hardy.’
In the afternoon I run along the beach, then write a couple of letters to Al L and my ma – and by a quarter to six it’s dark.
Eric, Tania, Charles McK, Terry J, Andrew M, Bernard and the Hamptons fill a table at the Café de la Plage et Coq. There is much singing of old English music hall numbers and First World War songs – at full voice, utterly drowning anyone else in the restaurant. A fine display of selfish and high-spirited behaviour. A release of a lot of tensions. The Coq treat us to a very tasty eau de vie-like liqueur and we toast the World’s Greatest, Most Long-Suffering and Least Flappable Waiter – Ali – with a rising chorus of’Ali, Ah, pride of our Sally’.
Tuesday, October 24th, Monastir
Farewell to Monastir.
I’m going to miss the place. I’ve shared a lot of experiences with the Hotel Meridien. The intense feelings of preparation for the movie and the five weeks of performing – with all the various degrees of tension, stress and strain which the peace of the Meridien has helped to smooth and minimise. In all its grand emptiness, it’s like leaving an old family home. The staff probably account for these feelings of sadness at departure. They have been universally friendly and good-natured. Yes, I shall miss them.
Gabes a nice, muddled town, at first glance, and the Hotel L’Oasis is down by the beach. The decoration is Russian twentieth century luxurious, but the two rooms I have (and two bathrooms) are pleasantly proportioned and have vaulted, white-painted ceilings.
Ate at the Ex-Franco Arabe Café de L’Oasis, to give it its full title, with John C and friend Charlotte. It turned out that