Paul sat in the small beach front shack in southern Goa and gazed through its rustic frame towards the horizon. The sea was placid for once, much like his mind, as the onshore breeze helped to keep his more turbulent thoughts at bay. He and Andrew were finally back in the bosom of Mother India. It had been nearly eight years since they had bid farewell to her balmy shores but he knew one day they would return. And it felt good. Even if they were settled in the […]
Since the age of ten Paul had lived his life as if he were in Dallas. Or rather – On Dallas! And he ‘d still never even been anywhere near the darn place. Except on BBC 1. in the early 80s. His childhood ‘dream’ was wishing ‘Jim’ would fix it for him to be on the Southfork patio, munching on eggs as over easy as america felt to a British kid back then. Grazing with the Ewings like entitled livestock. Brunching pool-side on the seemingly ever-breezy set – blown away […]
Was it egotistical to write of one’s own experiences? What else was there to write about? Even if an author took on the feelings of others or wrote fictionally about characters they’d invented it was still through the prism of their own imagination. A biography was still seen through the writer’s lense. What to include. Which details to omit. One’s perception of the world and the description of a universe which others inhabited always emanated from one’s own mind. We cannot, it seems, escape the bars of our own mental […]
Java had been a blast. A visceral assault on the senses that had inspired Paul to erupt with a molten flow of verbose lava most of which he deemed unpublishable. It was far too volcanic. He’d reached into his core and discovered more than enough explosive material to fuel a tectonic trilogy. But he wasn’t ready to vent quite yet and was keeping dormant. For now. He knew there would be a few quaking souls out there who would be unable to escape the fierce heat of his literary flow […]
Paul and Andrew had eventually found each other in a tatty room, in an old wooden house, in an equally tumbledown town deep in the south of Thailand. Their re-connection had been as ordinary as the abode they were renting, but Paul knew that was often the case with couples who’d been together as long as they had. Nearly thirty-two twelve month periods. Which was equivalent to four hundred and sixty eight in gay years! And now absence only seemed to make his hair grow blonder! (But that was another […]
Paul stood in the middle of the rice paddy in Ubud, an overly touristic, yet beautiful town in Bali. Her pavements were as cracked and decrepit as the numerous temples which studded the craggy urbanisation. Ancient jewels gleaming amongst the tacky souvenir shops. Gigantic poles of palm and bamboo, known as Panjur, decorated with fruits and flowers lined the streets and every lichen-clad statue had been draped in luscious cloth. Thousands of stone gods wrapped in gold and pink and red silk beckoned one to enter the courtyard beyond with […]
Lamphu House lay secreted down a hot, concrete, flip-flop clad alley. If one didn’t have a map it might never be found. It was what might be termed as old school. A hippy hideaway in the centre of Bangkok without the hip prices. The place was certainly authentic. The cackling of the girls and boys and others at reception. The banging and drilling in the early hours rattling the religious-esque courtyard, itself cooly sheltered by some venerable leafy giants quite oblivious to the life kicking beneath them, their […]
Paul sat in the shade of a wafting Tamarisk spared from the hot pale sand of the Greek beach and watched the ferries come and leave in the distance. He found it mesmerising to spectate as travellers came and went as he sat still. Not yet having to move. Having the audacity to stay for longer than an island hopper – or the good sense. Or perhaps the good fortune. Whatever – he felt lucky that his odyssey in the Cyclades Islands did not have to be as fleet as […]
Paul and Andrew had arrived in a country to which they had never been before, a paradisical place which made them both feel they didn’t want to leave. Her beauty and culture held them spellbound. Her nature kept them entranced. But most of all it was her people which kept them prisoner. The Lola Boys were now inmates on the Island of Sri Lanka. And willingly so! Surely there was nowhere on earth accommodating such an accommodating population. And Paul and Andrew had been around! The sheer joy which exuded […]
The Lola Boys said farewell to Negombo with heavy hearts – and even heavier heads. They had certainly made some new friends via Andy, an old mate who had once booked them for a few gigs in Gibraltar. He had got them acquainted to locals of every kind. Wineshops, women and song. A marvellous part of the delightful company to whom they’d been introduced was Jason – or rather, ‘Kandie’, Negombo’s resident drag queen. Paul and Andrew were all too aware that fellow performers could sometimes be less than generous […]
THE LOLA BOYS ABROAD ! 