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Book Review. Drug Run by Mervyn Billot
Tuesday, March 23rd 2010
BOOK REVIEW. A retired Jersey agricultural engineer, Mervyn Billot, has continued a second career as an author by writing an adventure novel: Drug Run. The book draws on his own experiences of cruising in Channel Island and Brittany waters. It is set in the Channel Islands and off the coast of France in the 1980s, and shows that rip-roaring tales of adventure on the high seas still find a market. It tells the tale of a retired couple, Winter and Nicola La Cloche, whose yacht is hijacked by drug runners who plan to use the couple as a front to deliver their stash of narcotics. It is action-packed book, filled with incident, plot twists and daring deeds. It is a complete change of subject for Billot, whose previous book was a scholarly history of agricultural tools in Jersey. Born in 1925 in Jersey of an old Jersey family, he was brought up on a farm and left before the Germany occupation for the islands during world war two. In 1943 he joined the navy and served for the last two years of the war in the Far East before becoming an agricultural engineer. He worked in the agricultural machinery manufacturing business in the UK for many years before opening his own garden machinery retail business. Nineteen years later he retired to Jersey and now lives in the Billot family home. “Messing about” in boats has been an interest of his since childhood, and he has cruised extensively. more
Tuesday, March 23rd 2010
RESTAURANT REVIEW. This old pub reopened recently following a £250,000 refurbishment. It always was a decent pub – an old building with lots of nooks and crannies, but everything has been upgraded, and it is now quite impressive. It likes to state that refurbishment notwithstanding, it has kept its original country atmosphere. It is certainly very popular: I went there on a Monday in February for lunch without reserving a table in advance, thinking it would be half empty, and I was lucky to get one of the last tables for two. And as I looked for a table, there were at least three parties of farming-related guests already there, so it seems to have kept its original clientele. It is part of The Liberation Group, the largest pub and drinks industry group in the Channels Islands. There has been a change in décor and a greater emphasis on wining and dining rather than just drinking – the way forward for so many country pubs that find it difficult to cope with the drink driving laws. But there is still cask ale and cider available as well as a full wine list. The décor combines modern and traditional materials to good effect. Although the new menu reflects the trend for gastro dining, it combines the old ‘best sellers’ with new dishes, and what we had was well-cooked and pleasantly served. Diners can also choose portion sizes, including children who can order smaller portions from the choice of a dozen dishes on the main menu and vegetarians are well catered for with a selection of interesting dishes. Lunch for two – two dishes from the à la carte menu, with one glass of wine and two coffees, was £26. A nice blend of country pub and restaurant. more
Café Zephyr, Jersey, Channel Islands
Monday, February 22nd 2010
RESTAURANT REVIEW. Part of a recent multi-million pound refurbishment and extension of what had been a very tired and dowdy pub-hotel. This à la carte restaurant has a general feel of modernity: shiny chrome and lots of glass and mugs of latté and would-be chic casual – even when, on closer inspection, the chrome is actually more in the mind’s eye than in reality. As its website says: ‘Definitely the place to be seen’. So if you want to be seen…. The nicest thing about it is the French-style terrasse in front, which is a pleasant place to enjoy a leisurely lunch during the summer, especially now that the street area outside has been pedestrianised and the once adjacent bus terminus removed elsewhere. It is certainly popular and wise to book – full even on a dismal cold Tuesday in January with snow falling by – and although on the noisy side, the tables inside are far enough away from each other to make that not so much of a problem. The food is nicely cooked: a menu majoring on fish and shellfish and light meat. Good presentation and well served. Neither food nor wine (extensive wine list) is particularly cheap, and in the past the hotel has suffered bad publicity from grossly over-charging on the bill at the end of a merry evening party. Lunch for two in January 2010: two fish dishes, one glass wine, one soft drink, two coffees, about £55. Perfectly nice, the casual chique atmosphere is transnational cosmopolitan - you could be anywhere in the casual-chique world, and nothing, in the menu, staff or atmosphere, says: ‘This is Jersey’. more
Monday, February 15th 2010
15-18 February 2010. Jersey Arts Centre is having a book sale to raise money for the centre. The Arts Centre is one of the main cultural centres on the island. It has a theatre, which also doubles as a concert hall, an exhibition space, an art studio for about 30 people and various meeting halls, as well as bar. more
Tour de Bretagne comes to Jersey
Sunday, April 25th 2010
Jersey will stage the opening legs of one of France’s biggest cycling events this year. When the Tour de Bretagne comes to the island in April, it will be the first time that any part of the week-long race has been held outside Brittany. Time trials for the event were held in Jersey in 2007, but this year Jersey will stage the first two days of the race itself. Around 400 cyclists are expected to take part in the prestigious event, which starts on 25 April and is due end on 1 May in Dinan. A 93-mile (150 km) route will run from Gorey through the eastern parishes, while a 6¼-mile (10 km) time trail will take place on Monday 26 April along the Five Mile Road. Jersey has received high-profile endorsements to host the first two days of the race. Cycling world champion and five-time Tour de France winner Bernard Hinault said that Jersey had a great appeal to cycling enthusiasts after the first time trials were held in the island in 2007. And the regional president of Brittany, Jean Yves Le Drian, granted special permission for the Tour de Bretagne to be held in Jersey. Although most of the cyclists will be French, a member of British teams are due to take part. A locally backed team, Sprocket Pro-Cycling, led by Paris-Roubaix champion Magnus Backstedt, is also expected to race. more
Book review: Deported from Jersey
Saturday, February 6th 2010
A new book published by Jersey Heritage, Occupied Behind Barbed Wire, takes as its subject the experience of wartime Channel Island internees, as expressed through the range of artefacts and art they produced in captivity. From 1942 to 1945, around 2,300 Channel Islanders were forcibly deported to German civilian internment camps in France, Germany, and further afield. Using mainly their Red Cross parcels as raw materials, they recycled the wooden parcel crates, parcel wrapping and string, cardboard parcels, cellophane packing materials and empty food tins to make items that ranged from football trophies to communion chalices, chess sets to stage sets, and brooches to trinket boxes. Examining these often-overlooked items is the author, Dr Gillian Carr, from Guernsey, a university lecturer in archaeology at the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Continuing Education. Non-native Channel Islanders were deported as a reciprocal measure for the internment by the British of German Nationals in Iran. The most poignant tales are sometimes told by the artwork and handicrafts made by the internees, which are today spread across private and public museums, archives and homes across the Channel Islands. From 12 December 1942 onwards the Red Cross began to send regular parcels to the camps. People were so hungry that one internee wrote that she ‘nearly ate the wrappings as well’. The Red Cross food tins were especially easy and popular to recycle, once it was discovered that they could be easily flattened and folded or cut into new objects. Sharp edges could be folded over, edges could be crimped and surfaces could be – and were – engraved. People began to make plates, mugs and trays, sometimes engraved, and would give them as gifts. Other examples of recycled tins included sports trophies, hair curlers, a communion chalice, primus stoves and a coffee percolator. The string was dyed using various foodstuffs, such as beetroot or red cabbage, to make bright colours. The cardboard itself could be used to make the template for soles of shoes. The wooden packing cases were useful for making into items of furniture, or into board games such as shove-ha’penny or cribbage. Florence Fish, interned in Wurzach, made nearly 100 Heidi dolls from scraps of material provided by fellow internees. The hair, hat and basket were made from parcel string and the doll’s socks were made from bandages. The fashion for making Christmas cards became very popular. The work of certain talented artists crops up in many personal collections in the Channel Islands today. Theatres were set up in all the camps, and hugely well-attended plays and variety shows were held frequently, the costumes for which were made from YMCA-supplied crêpe paper and Red Cross clothing. To quote from an internee’s diary: ‘Although the Germans have got us behind barbed wire, they cannot stop us enjoying ourselves.’’ more
Monday, February 15th 2010
15 Feb-27 March. Over 70 restaurants will be promoting their best food with specially priced menus. The emphasis is on the best of local chefs, local cooking and local ingredients. more
Wednesday, January 20th 2010
Biggest and best yet - that is the Jersey Chamber Orchestra concert on Saturday 30 January in aid of Autism Jersey. Playing with the Jersey Chamber Orchestra will be possibly the world’s best viola player, Lawrence Power, and his duetting partner, the Grammy nominated violinist, Marianne Thorsen. The evening with the Jersey Chamber Orchestra will feature some of the most famous and exciting classics. The overture is a series of Romanian Dances, and following that the two star soloists will perform Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante for violin, viola and orchestra. This piece is rated by many as Mozart’s best composition. Finally, in the second half the Jersey Chamber Orchestra will play Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony. The soloists regularly perform this piece together in the world’s greatest concert halls and did so recently with the Philharmonia. The concert at the Jersey Opera House on Saturday 30 January 2010 will raise money for the Autism Jersey charity. It is being sponsored by HSBC Private Bank. more
Book Review. A Concise History of Jersey: A New Perspective.
Wednesday, January 13th 2010
By Colin Platt. The author has strong family connections with Jersey, is the author of many books on social history, and is an emeritus professor of Southampton University. He was also a major contributor to the debate on the restoration of Mont Orgueil Castle, one of the island’s foremost historical monuments, that was completed in 2006. The word “concise” is the key to this book, which has only some 140 pages of text. The narrative is plain and straightforward, and would be an excellent book to give to any of the increasing number of residents in Jersey who have come recently on account of their work, are interested in Jersey, but have no deep knowledge of the island’s history or of the historical factors that have contributed to make what the island is today. Anyone who knows little or nothing of Jersey history can only be better informed about the island after reading Platt’s book. But it is more than an overview of Jersey history. As the author says, it is a new perspective, and an exposition of his view that the history of Jersey is formed by its reaction to external factors: “Jersey is a minor player in a huge global market which has no material interest in its survival.” As Platt writes in the envoi to his book: “The Island has a proud history of survival. But each of its ‘revolutions’, from the sudden death of stocking knitting to the ‘Capture of the State’ by the banking interest of today, have been authored from outside, and there have been substantial periods of misery in between.” Fingers crossed, then, that we are not coming up to another such substantial period. more
Monday, January 11th 2010
11-31 Jan. About 20 images by the brothers Jake and Dinos Chapman based on the join-the-dots technique used by children. As part of the Young British Artists the Chapman brothers are known as the bad boys of Brit Art thanks to their often shocking and always thought-provoking imagery. They have worked together since they graduated from the Royal College of Art in 1990. This is a touring exhibition organised by the Arts Council of England. more