Low life
No dates in Marrakesh
' Jeffrey Bernard
Ihave just had an offer from an Ameri- can, up-market, glossy magazine asking me if I would like to go to Marrakesh to write about it. I am glad that somebody can make up their mind so quickly — it took the editor a mere 24 hours to make his mind up that I should go — while a couple of English newspapers have been debating some trips for weeks and weeks. But Mar- rakesh should be fun, and they are allowing me to take Sister Sally with me to push me around the souks and the luxury hotel we shall be staying in.
Years ago I thought I could have given a fair imitation of Peter O'Toole with the desert as a backdrop but now it would take
`I'm a novelist, but I've had writer's block since birth'
all of O'Toole's acting skills to portray me being barred from an oasis, which is quite likely to happen. I have never been to Morocco and the nearest I have ventured to it is Tunisia where I went on a freebie ages ago. It was there that I broke a couple of my front teeth by putting a bottle of vodka to my lips on our coach, the driver of which refused to stop for refreshment and drove for parched hours over bumpy roads. As far as I know, this is a dental disaster that is impossible to insure against. So are the people you end up having to put up with if you go on a group freebie.
After one such trip to Barbados, made memorable by the refusal of a highly paid hackette on the Daily Sketch to buy one single drink during an entire week, she later tried to physically attack me in Fleet Street because I complained about her meanness.
But the most memorable of all trips, that made even Marco Polo seem like a well- cossetted toddler, was the one on which the PR in charge allowed me to choose the cast. We comprised myself, Professor Lau- rie Taylor, Richard West, Sally Vincent, Irma Kurtz and Anne Leslie. Libel laws and a deep concern for the safety of my old skin forbid me from telling you here and now exactly what happened and, anyway, I am saving the story to turn into a play of Shakespearean proportions which will have several plays within the play plus a comic opera in it as well. After all these years I still sometimes wonder if they ever mention our little troupe in political circles in Bridgetown. And I also sometimes wonder if that good old English habit of rowing and weeping between courses was ever taken up seriously by the Lord Mayor's office. At a later date, I believe that Wes Hall, the great West Indian fast bowler, became the Minister of Tourism and I wonder if he would ever have coped with having his balls hit all over the island.
At least I will have very little trouble with Sister Sally in Marrakesh. I have already warned her that, because of a reli- gious Muslim festival, women are not allowed to speak during July. I had thought of piling it on a little by telling her that it will also be required of her to keep her mouth covered but I thought that might be going a bit far and, anyway, I shall always remember the delightful smile she gave me when I first woke up from having my leg off.
It is a bit of a blow to have recently been told by the kidney consultants at the Mid- dlesex Hospital that I may never taste cit- rus fruit again and that dates are death to a diabetic, but anyway I hate them. I suppose that this could be the last trip I make if after it I start going on dialysis, as I don't fancy much or trust particularly the machines and the doctors operating them in deepest Africa, Outer Mongolia or any- where in China. I wonder what on earth happens to these machines in the event of a power failure? I imagine one would immediately dive into a large vodka and fresh Moroccan orange juice and go to sleep. The thing is, Sister Sally natters so much, even that sleep would elude me.
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