Just call me Flashdance
It was a simple enough plan - drop car off at Canning Town for its MOT, get train to 'Ackney and then to Enfield Lock to work on boat. So simple, that I ended up on the wrong train heading to Chigwell. Got a train back a stop only to find the Enfield train didn't stop there.
It was getting late so I thought I would just get a cab. £15 to the dock, a big layout, but I would save about an hour.
But it wasn't to be - all the roads in Clapton were shut off because of an 'incident'.
So, I passed the time with the driver Peter, and I was glad I did. He was a really interesting bloke. He left Uganda in the early 60s, trained as a psychiatric and theatre nurse in Manchester and worked all the hours he could so he could send his daughter to boarding school. He is very proud of the fact that she is now a lawyer in the US.
He is on his second marriage, to a woman from Senegal, and they have an eight-year-old son. He made sure the boy is 'engaged' outside of school by enrolling him in tennis school, tap and ballet lessons and piano lessons!
His mother and two sisters are still in Uganda, but his two brothers died of AIDS.
He is now retired and spends his time doing a bit of cabbing and working for an AIDS charity which assists Ugandans in this country.
He loves comedy and goes to the Edinburgh fringe every year and follows tennis. He had a lovely mellow way of speaking and totally calmed me down as I was rather worked up over the fact my journey was not going to plan and there was a lot of work to do on the boat.
When I finally got to Enfield, Ganges was looking horrendous. The guys were busy scraping the bottom. They think there is some welding that needs doing, but the surveyor will check properly tomorrow. I also need four new anodes.
I spent the day in overalls wielding an angle grinder, scraping the paint off the roof to cut through the rust spots. I felt just like Flashdance, except I wasn't welding.
It's a worry, you know, rust on the boat. It breaks my heart to think I don't look after her properly. I think I will have to sell her, much against my heart's judgement, as it is such a drain financially and I never really use her. But it will be hard. It is like selling your dog.
It was getting late so I thought I would just get a cab. £15 to the dock, a big layout, but I would save about an hour.
But it wasn't to be - all the roads in Clapton were shut off because of an 'incident'.
So, I passed the time with the driver Peter, and I was glad I did. He was a really interesting bloke. He left Uganda in the early 60s, trained as a psychiatric and theatre nurse in Manchester and worked all the hours he could so he could send his daughter to boarding school. He is very proud of the fact that she is now a lawyer in the US.
He is on his second marriage, to a woman from Senegal, and they have an eight-year-old son. He made sure the boy is 'engaged' outside of school by enrolling him in tennis school, tap and ballet lessons and piano lessons!
His mother and two sisters are still in Uganda, but his two brothers died of AIDS.
He is now retired and spends his time doing a bit of cabbing and working for an AIDS charity which assists Ugandans in this country.
He loves comedy and goes to the Edinburgh fringe every year and follows tennis. He had a lovely mellow way of speaking and totally calmed me down as I was rather worked up over the fact my journey was not going to plan and there was a lot of work to do on the boat.
When I finally got to Enfield, Ganges was looking horrendous. The guys were busy scraping the bottom. They think there is some welding that needs doing, but the surveyor will check properly tomorrow. I also need four new anodes.
I spent the day in overalls wielding an angle grinder, scraping the paint off the roof to cut through the rust spots. I felt just like Flashdance, except I wasn't welding.
It's a worry, you know, rust on the boat. It breaks my heart to think I don't look after her properly. I think I will have to sell her, much against my heart's judgement, as it is such a drain financially and I never really use her. But it will be hard. It is like selling your dog.
posted by The WyeBird @ 6:06 pm
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