Sentimental journeys '69
AFTERTHOUGHT JOHN WELLS
At this chilly and inclement season of the year, writes Barry Grovel, Advertising Manager of the Sundry Trash, a lot of people, very naturally, start feeling those old, old stirrings of wanderlust that brought our rude forebears straggling half way across the steppes of Central Asia before the dawn of time, and which even today still motivate our feathery friends as they gather on the treetops and on the telegraph wires prior to flitting away in search of sunnier climes. For some it may be the dim yen to sample the exotic charms of a Lebanese zhufti, crouching perhaps athwart the dark waters of a gurgling underground stream. For others a breathless hanker to be rubbing shoulders with a host of other trend-con-scions Sundry Trash readers as you explore the quaint remoteness of an unspoilt dell in the Western Hebrides recently pinpointed in our pages as an asylum of timeless seclusion and unbroken peace.
And for me too, each January, the finger irresistibly beckons. To a venue less remote perhaps, but no less exotic, and no less rich certainly in mystery and adventure. I refer to London Town. For the inexperienced adver- tising manager, looking for a reasonably priced holiday supplement without language difficulties and on casual and relaxed lines, I always think you can do a great deal worse than Victoria. This little backwater, with its soaring modern skyscraper blocks and acres of grey-green glass, its colourful fruit stalls and nostalgic, smelly arcades, is easily reached from Fleet Street (No. 22 bus Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays or Underground—see winter schedules) and posi- tively abounds in travel bureaux and shipping offices, where the advertising manager can be assured, if not of a warm welcome, then at least that he will not be pinioned by burly thugs and thrown down the lift-shaft: Scroggit and Lard, for instance, whose offices offer a breathtaking view over the back of Victoria Station.
What to do, you may ask, when you get there? For the active, out-of-door type, admit- tedly, the restricted conditions in Mr Scroggit's sanctum—Miss Lard, his secretary, has to stand on her desk whenever anyone wants to open the door—may seem a drawback. But for those who are content simply to put their feet up— which is, incidentally, the only place to put them chez Scroggit—and laze, Mr Scroggit's unusual collection of early post-war Nudie Calendars and full-colour poster of the Lake of Geneva are a unique experience. Excursions are not encouraged, but for prOfessional climbers the dizzy ascent of the rust-eroded fire-escape to the early twentieth-century gentlemen's lavatory is said to rank with the Old Man of Prestatyn as a test of ingenuity and giddy daring. Small advertisements can be had for as little as a monochrome photograph of Ibiza at the foot of a column, and Mr Scroggit is prepared to offer special terms in exchange for a modestly phrased caption like `The sun, the sea and tropical palms . .1 For those looking for a more lavish holiday supplement I wouldsrecommend Knightsbridge. This bustling upper-middle-class ghetto is again jam-packed with fascinating little offices, is within reasonable distance of Fleet Street (the mid-morning and mid-afternoon runs offer the most comfort) and language problems are not insuperable. A favourite resort of mine on a January afternoon is Butt and Grapple Cruises, just round the corner from Harrod's. The accommodation is more than adequate, and the advertising manager can sprawl comfortably on the deep deep cushions beside the potted plastic ferns in the outer office among a regular concours d'ilegance: fine ladies in furs and strange perfumes mingle at the inquiry desks, the recorded melodies of a bygone age lilt and warble through discreet loudspeakers, and when one is admitted into the office of the proprietor, Monsieur Hackett, it is with a wide smile and a cup of delicious Arab Blend Quick-Brew Tea. Half column semi-display for as little as two hundred words on Baden Baden by Lord Snow.
In the luxury range, many advertising man- agers will be tempted by Bond Street. Here, tradition walks hand in band with tasteful opulence, and the ambitious traveller may find his way into the palatial Sheiki Tyurist of Kuwait, a lavish playground where the rustic easy-going peace of Victoria or Knightsbridge is abandoned for the heady pace of the inter- national jet set. Here you can sip a creme de menthe frappe as you glide across the polished marble to the strains of the 'Skaters' Waltz,' speeding perhaps in the wake of a dusky entre- preneur in billowing silken robes and enigmatic dark glasses. Or cast off your cares with your clothes as you plunge into the ornamental pool, and gambol skittishly beneath the plashing fountain in the hopes of interesting a black- bespectacled client tugging at his beard on a nearby sofa. The rewards are unquestionably enormous, but the cost is high: some have blenched at having to offer two thousand words by Cyril. Connolly on Bicycling in Kuwait for as little as a half-page advertisement, but all agree that the holiday supplement they had in the end was unforgettable.
For the truly adventurous. who find perhaps that such pleasures too easily cloy, why not join a Safari to Notting Hill Gate or West Kensington, an area from which, even today, advertising managers have not returned? A wilderness of rogue agencies, where primitive organisations still abandon parties of tourists on distant Spanish beaches, or sacrifice them to hostile powers? One such wilderness is Bonanza Sunshine Welcome Tours, the almost impenetrable warren of offices where unwary trippers have been, according to reports, skinned and even eaten alive within living memory. In the company of a trained hunter, you still may catch a glimpse of the rare 'Mad' Flannagans, the aboriginal proprietors, now officially extinct, and who have resisted the efforts of zoo-men and police to capture them for over ten years. You may even wrestle with man-eating Janos Dudczek, the Gorilla of Notting Hill, the firm's chief accountant.
Again, despite the danger, the rewards are tantalising: you too, like my colleague, Basil Gormley, now on extended furlough in the West Country, might one day return with eight full-page colour spreads advertising package holidays in Lyonesse, offered him gratis and for nothing by Granny Flannagan herself on her knees, begging him to print just the adver- tisement, not one word of supporting text or a single photograph—the perfect holiday sup- plement, encapsulated in one sentence: in Basil's case, ten years.
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