Just Say When

Britainís binge-drinkers, as anybody unfortunate enough to encounter them in full flow will know, can be a repellent bunch. After downing bucketloads of alcohol they spill onto the streets on Friday and Saturday nights to vomit, brawl and bare their chests. The men are pretty awful, too.

Some would argue that today's binge-drinkers are merely following an ancient tradition. The Vikings, for instance, liked a bit of rape and pillage but also had a penchant for getting legless after a good slaughter.

And, as if they needed any excuse, here is the festive season.

Thankfully, I am here not there. So, praise the lord and pass the um - well, let's pause and consider.

During the past few weeks in Thailand , most of us have alcohol pressed on us at unusual times and unusual places. We have been invited to drink before lunch, at lunch, after work and at work. There will be parties that start before dinner and carry on after dinner, but do not involve dinner. If you don't usually drink much, the festive season is bound to be a bit of a trial. If you drink heavily all year round, then this is the event you've been training for.

The key to surviving is strategy. Although it may not seem like it, you do have choices, especially with regards to drinks. Whenever possible, accept only the following:

Wine: my knowledge of wine is like my knowledge of chess. I know the moves but I don't care about the game.

Red wine: standard issue, festive coloured Christmas beverage. You know where you are with it, as a telltale maroon crust along your upper lip informs you when youíve had enough. Very clever. Who thought of that?

White wine: a pale and inferior alternative to red wine, unless the red wine has run out, in which case itís every bit as good, maybe better.

Beer: this low-alcohol wine-substitute has been around for centuries. Its mysterious bladder-swelling properties regulate intake automatically.

Bloody Marys: far and away the most nutritious of festive drinks, the bloody Mary contains no less then two of the four basic food groups, if you count vodka as a grain. And I do. As a large part of the festive season revolves drinking in the day, the bloody Mary represents a nice compromise between cocktail and breakfast.

Whisky: take only for medicinal purposes, and after your mother in law has gone to bed.

Water: while technically non-alcoholic, water is extremely refreshing. It's also free on tap in most upmarket hotel toilets, and while you're there you can rest your forehead on the nice, cool floor tiles.

Stick with these basics and you should feel fine around January 12th.

The following, however, present problems:

Champagne : a glass or two is fine, but if it doesn't run out after that, it's best to switch to something else as soon as possible. Remarkably, champagne can give you a hangover while you're still drinking it. And if your champagne seems darker than usual and has a sugar cube dissolving in the bottom of it, put it down straight away. Someone is trying to drug you.

Cider: Wonderful stuff. The only downside of being intoxicated with good quality cider is that your legs go wobbly. You come out of the pub feeling like a cross between Aristotle and Attila the Hun, and you fall over. But if you are intent on behaving badly, this is the stuff to do it on.

Punch: suffice to say that most punch is a combination of things you wouldnít drink on their own, which produce appalling side affects when mixed. If you feel you must have some punch, try to drink it early on, before the person who makes it gets drunk.

Mulled wine: you probably won't find it over here anyway, which is good, as you're not meant to drink it. It's a cold climate decoration, like holly. In fact, it's poisonous.

Gin: too much will make you maudlin, and therefore boring company.

Sherry: for dead aunts.

Cocktails: put it this way, peering into the glass tank in a hi-so priced Sathorn restaurant about eight years ago, I had to look twice before confirming that the parrotfish propelling himself lugubriously round the enclosure had only one eye, having feared at first it was the second El Dorado Thunderbird cocktail getting to me. But when I queried the fish's condition with the Italian manager there was not a moment's hesitation: “Oh, no worry, Sir, he lost it in the war,” and I was already woozled enough to ask him which one.

Cocktails look pretty and colourful and are therefore lethal. But if you are between 18 and 25 and can easily quaff 17 shots with “kaze” on the end of them, the following afternoon you will just be able to belly-surf down the stairs and into the kitchen looking for anything that might stop the headache, severe hydration, nausea and blindness. And, while we're at it, -never- mix the grape with the grain.

Sang Thip: rum under another name. Mix it with soda. Share it with your driver.

Lao Kao: zippo fuel under another name. Explosive. Don't stand up too fast, or you will sink like an anchor.

Sake: It's the only alcoholic drink I ever consider turning down on the grounds that it tastes like a mixture of hot spit and Windex. However, the fact that it's most often served in those bafflingly tiny cups is a testament to its importance as a social lubricant. Japanese custom places value on refilling your companion's cups. Smaller cups: more good fellowship.

Madeira : an old person's island and an old person's drink. The island was discovered accidentally in 1419 by Goncalves Zarco, whom I suspect of having bumped into a lot of places by accident given that he was known as Zarco the Cross-Eyed.

Absinthe: More nausea and blindness. In the 19th century absinthe was a liqueur with alcohol, wormwood (in Greek - apsinthion-) and anise as essential ingredients. It had an alcohol level of up to 75 per cent. The addition of water to the emerald liquid freed plant oils suspended in the alcohol and made it a cloudy pale green drink, an effect known as “louching”. Many dreamy hours were spent in observing this magical process taking place in a glass. Absinthe had a part in the creation of the French overseas empire in North Africa and Indo-China when it was used as a disinfectant and anti-malarial by the troops.

Absinthe-quaffing art critic Theodore Pelloquet, who was never without an absinthe until he died at 48, was half paralysed and able only to say “abs” Some of his grieving friends chose to assume that he was calling for absolution.

Drinks with Christmassy names: never order anything called I Saw Mummy Kissing Santa Clause, a Lapland Express or a Frankincense Flip. More often than not it's just a kamikaze with a umbrella stuck in it.

It's not enough to restrict ourselves to certain types of drink. We must also prepare for dangerous events.

The office party: office Christmas parties range in size from lunches striving to be a creepy simulacrum of the Christmas Day meal - complete with turkey and Christmas hats - to a large night-club take-overs sponsored by some new brand of vodka.

Other people's office parties: only masochists go to these things. If you are merely a client, customer or contract supplier, you can probably get away without making an appearance, since no one really knows who you are anyway. If you feel you must attend, remove all your business cards from your wallet before you drink yourself into a stupor.

Elsewhere: at the end of every Christmas party, there is small contingent making hasty plans to go “elsewhere”, usually to night club or another party to which none of the of the group has been invited. If you are part of this contingent, then you already stayed too long at the first party.

Have fun, but remember this: The late and much lamented English columnist Jeffrey Bernard, who suffered from a lifelong weakness for horses, women and drink - and it was the alcohol that killed him - sent a letter to The London Times which read: “I have been asked to write my autobiography and would grateful if anyone could tell me what I was doing between 1960 and 1974.”

By Roger Beaumont
  Available at Bookazine

By David Cocksedge

THOMAS MARTEN was muttering to himself as he crossed a narrow crest of land separating the Corder Estate from the village of Polstead in rural Suffolk , England . The date was 19 April 1828 and as it was nearing dawn Marten carried a lantern. Marten walked towards the red barn, a prominent structure in a cluster of buildings that overlooked Polstead from the Corder property. He was making the journey to placate the constant nagging of his wife Anne. For several nights, Anne had suffered the same nightmare: their only daughter, Maria, was murdered in the red barn and her body swallowed whole inside the right-hand bay of the building.

Almost a year earlier, on 18 May 1827, Maria had eloped with William Corder after a rendezvous at the barn. Both parents had not heard from her since. Thomas Marten knocked on the door of Corder's bailiff, Mr Pryke, and told him that he was searching for some of Maria's clothes that may have been left in the barn when she eloped. Once the barn was open, Marten went to the right-hand bay. As he probed the ground with his walking stick, he felt an obstruction. He and Pryke scratched through soft earth to find a sack that had been buried in a hollow pit. The sack had deteriorated so much that they could easily tear it away to reveal a decomposing female corpse curled in the fetal position. It was later determined that she had been shot in the chest at close range, and the pistol ball had lodged in the upper part of her spine.

Fighting back his revulsion, Marten examined the rotting flesh until he recognised earrings and a green scarf that belonged to his daughter. Pryke raced from the barn towards the village where he summoned Polstead's constable and told him of their gruesome find. This was clearly a case of murder and the immediate suspect was William Corder, known to be the lover of Maria Marten.

The Corder family had lived in a two-storey, Tudor-style house from which they administered 300 acres of prime farmland. In 1826 after three of his sons died from disease or drowning, John Corder (senior) died from grief leaving only one son - William. Maria Marten was no paragon of virtue and had a progressive involvement with the Corder family. By the age of 24, she had produced three illegitimate children, one by William Corder's eldest brother, Thomas.

Now William Corder had three older brothers – John Corder Junior; James and Thomas. But because he did not help out on the farm, preferring reading and literary pursuits, William was not favoured by his father, who informed him that he would exclude him from his will. On inheriting the farm, his brothers could employ him – if they so wished. William was unhappy with this arrangement and retaliated by stealing and selling some of his father's livestock.

Then within a year of Maria giving birth to their child, Thomas Corder drowned in a pond near Polstead village and James and John died from typhus and tuberculosis respectively. A grief-stricken John Corder senior died soon afterwards. Whilst William Corder improved his fortunes through these tragedies, there were still legal difficulties preventing him from claiming inheritance of the farm as sole heir. Soon he and Maria Marten became romantically involved, and discussed marriage after she gave birth to his son in the spring of 1827. The poor child died within a month, however, and his parents buried him in an unmarked grave. Gossips in Polstead village were soon discussing this scandal, but the death of their child was not officially investigated due to Corder's prominence in the local community. But Maria began to press him for a marriage date, and they had many arguments as William constantly postponed any such plans.

Then on Friday, 18 May 1827 William told Maria that they would meet at the barn and elope to nearby Ipswich , where they would be married. They would return to the Corder estate when he became legal heir to his father's estate. Still concerned about the threat of arrest over their baby's death, Corder asked Maria to wear clothing that had belonged to his late brother James so villagers might not recognise her as she approached the red barn. Accordingly, Maria wore a jacket and trousers as she went to meet William Corder that evening.

The Martens saw William Corder soon after this, and when asked about Maria, he replied that she was in Ipswich , waiting for the local authorities to process the marriage licence. She was also selecting a new wardrobe and furniture for their future together. People accepted this explanation, but Anne Marten became suspicious when she saw Corder at a funeral carrying Maria's green umbrella.

Days later, Corder left the village, claiming that he was going to join Maria in Ipswich . But he went to London instead – and obviously planned never to return. Then Anne Marten began to experience her recurring nightmare; and Maria's body was discovered. When Police Constable Jonas Lea tracked him down months later in the capital city, William Corder said that he had never even heard of Maria Marten!

Lea was a thorough and methodical detective. Knowing Corder's liteary bent, and his previous jaunts to London , Lea frequented various urban writers' haunts where he learned that William Corder had married a schoolmistress named Kathleen Moore. He had met her in the coastal resort of Brighton years before getting involved with Maria Marten. Corder and the former Miss Moore set up a school together in Ealing, west London , and were enjoying life until Constable Lea completed his investigations and accused Corder of murdering Maria Marten in the red barn at Polstead, Suffolk .

The trial began on 7 August 1827 at Bury St Edmunds Assizes. Corder's defence lawyer asked the presiding judge to halt the trial and change the venue due to all the local hostility directed at his client. Mr Justice Alexander was concerned at the public displays of anger but allowed the trial to proceed with Corder protected by a cordon of constables at all times. As he entered and left the court each day, William Corder was jostled and spat upon by members of an angry mob.

Corder could not deny any knowledge of Maria Marten when her mother testified and retold her prophetic dream. Two witnesses stated that Corder borrowed a pickaxe and shovel from them on 18 May 1827. The prosecution team also produced a flintlock duelling pistol and ammunition, matching the calibre of the murder weapon. This had been found in a velvet bag in Corder's home in Ealing. Anne Marten testified that the velvet bag had originally belonged to her daughter.

Corder now changed his story. Speaking under oath, he said that he and Maria had met at the red barn, but he had walked away after yet another quarrel over a marriage date. He was heading back to his home when he heard a gunshot. He ran back to the barn to find Maria sprawled on the floor with a discharged pistol in her right hand. Horrified that he might be accused of murdering her, he had swiftly buried her body in the barn and left. On reflection, he reasoned that she must have stolen the pistol from his own bedroom.

No one attending the trial believed this version of events, and nor did the jury. They found him guilty of murder after only thirty minutes of deliberation. Just hours before he faced the hangman, William Corder again amended his story. He now stated that his argument with Maria had escalated into violence. As she screamed and slapped him in the face, he had removed his pistol from his coat pocket and the weapon accidentally went off as they struggled. She had died in his arms.

But he could not explain why he had borrowed a pickaxe and shovel from neighbours on the afternoon of 18 May 1827, the last day of Maria's life. And why did he have a loaded pistol in his pocket as he waited for Maria to meet him at the red barn that evening? All the evidence still pointed towards premeditated murder.

Even if could have proved his latest assertion, Corder could not escape his sentence. On the appointed day of execution, an audience of thousands watched the public spectacle as he slowly ascended the steps to the gallows. Corder's last words were that he deserved his fate. Then the hangman slipped a hood over his head and tightened the noose around his neck before releasing the trapdoor beneath the feet of the condemned man.

William Corder twisted and twitched for an agonising ten minutes before he finally died. Today Corder's scalp, death mask, and the pistol he admittedly used to kill Maria Marten are on display at a museum in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk . These exhibits are powerful evidence of Anne Marten's prophetic nightmare involving her daughter's death.

(Research, ‘The Mystery of the Red Barn' by G Mark Jackson, Fate Magazine, September 2001. My thanks also to Graeme Jones for sending me this story).

IF YOU need a check on my True Crime series of stories, published in the Hua Hin Observer, here is a complete list to date:
April 2002 -The Green Bicycle case, 1921. May 2002 - The Craig/Bentley Case, 1952. June 2002 - The A6 Murder Case, 1961. July 2002 - Murder of the Earl of Errol, 1941. August 2002 - The O J Simpson murder trial, 1995. September 2002 - The Aileen Wuornos case, 1989. October 2002 - The Ronald Opus case, 1993. November 2002 - Madame X, 1929. December 2002 - The Spree Killer, 1984. January 2003 - Shootout at Smiths' Club, 1966. February 2003 - The Christine Dryland case, 1991. March 2003 - Poisoned Pie in Essex, 1982. April 2003 - The Heydrich assassination, 1943. May 2003 - The Diana Davidson Murder case, 1969. June 2003 - The death of Alkibiades, 404 BC. July 2003 - The headsman of Colmar, 1780. August 2003 - The Ruth Ellis case, 1955. September 2003 - The Mel Jones Murder case, 1975. October 2003 - The Bluebeard of the bath, 1915. November 2003 - Murder in a combat zone, 1966. December 2003 - The Barn Restaurant murder case, 1972. January 2004 - The assassination of JFK, 1963. February 2004 - Judge Falcone and the Mafia, 1992. March 2004 - Gilles de Rais/Bluebeard, 1404-1440. April 2004 - The hand in the sand case, 1885. May 2004 - The body in the bag, 1979.

THE BUSINESS OF PLEASURE

by Keith Baker

The spirit house outside the Imperial Queen's Park Hotel is slightly bigger than my first apartment. Believe me, these spirits have got it made. With a nice view overlooking the park, it wouldn't surprise me if, under that little wooden roof, there was an ensuite bathroom, tiny “Emporium” scatter cushions, and cable TV.

From the park, there is a discreet path that leads to the back of the hotel, which passes this spiritual condo, and then up the stairs into a restaurant with polite food. I remember the roast lamb being impeccable; it was a lamb you could have taken anywhere.

There is also a small sign by the glass door which reads, “Hotel guests are welcome to use the gate into the park, which closes at 8 p.m.” It's all so civilized-----and a far cry from the scruffy, beer –stained sign nailed on to the back door of my student lodgings in London which read, “Please don't vomit on the floor, what do you think the seats are for?”

I have to confess that I use this impressive hotel as a short cut to my humble abode a few metres from the main entrance. After walking through the slum that is Klong Toey, it's comforting---once I've got rid of the guilt-----to feel the cool opulence of the marble floors, and to breathe the scent of expense, after the stench of poverty.

One of the house butlers, Keith Dellar, has noticed my regular deviations, because, as a butler, he sees everything. He also knows that I know that he knows it. It's all part of his job.

We've been on friendly terms for some years now, and I often call out, “Good evening squire,” to him across the hotel lobby, which, these days, seems crammed with Japanese tourists. He may often reply with, “Good evening my lord we're a dying,” over their heads. Being dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, it's always a buzz to be referred to in that language, and even more of a buzz to see the Japanese looking totally bewildered at the interchange.

Keith Dellar and Julio Duque are full-time resident butlers; positions they have held since 1992, when they were asked by Akorn Hoontrakul-----the then head of the Imperial Group, whom they had met in London that year----to come to Thailand . It was a shrewd move, and stamped with the class it delivered.

I had many questions for Keith; questions I'd always wanted to ask a butler, but had never had the chance because, somehow, I'd never actually got around to having a butler of my own.

Resplendent in their formal morning dress, with a fresh rose in their respective buttonholes, roaming the restaurants and hovering in the grand lobby, do they sometimes get mistaken for being the manager?

“Oh yes, often,” says Keith. “We've also been mistaken for wedding guests and classical conductors. Some guests even ask me if I'm the owner.”

“Does that bother you?”

“Not a bit. But it might bother him,” he said grinning.

As professional butlers for over forty years, both Dellar and Duque treat everyone as an equal, whether they be of the landed gentry or those who have just landed gently, a titled gentleman, or the third wife of a Toyota dealer from Cambodia . It makes no difference. Why?

Because they are paying.

Ah.So the customer, even if he's an arrogant prat who can't even spell the word “manners” and

doesn't have a clue what's going on around him, is always right. Right?

“Absolutely,yes,” says Keith with complete conviction.

I would have a big problem with that. In fact I do have a big problem with that—and it's one of the reasons why I've never worked in the service industry.

I simply don't have the right disposition. I would rather dig ditches than serve table. And I have. I find it impossible to serve people who are ruder and more arrogant than either the people I work for, or with.

And to be honest, I'm not such a good guest either.

Whenever I get the rare chance to stay in a quality hotel, I don't so much occupy a room as disturb it. I immediately turn everything on, and then steal everything in the bathroom---including the sewing kit and those cotton wool thingies. After all, there's no crime like the present, and what's more, one is actually paying for the privilege to pilfer. I always look twice at the sumptuous bath robes, but I know I'll get sprung. And when I'm guilty, I blush. Even when there's no one around.

However, there's always one rule, shared by millions. Never touch the mini bar. I have worked out that if you drank and ate everything in the mini bar of a downtown Tokyo hotel, it would equal the gross national output of a small African country---and that's in a good year.

“We do have our ways at getting back at the truly rude,” Keeth conceded, looking inscrutable. I raised an eyebrow in conspiratorial hope. But nothing doing. No trade secrets.

But this is to miss the point. Taking care of people, rather than merely serving them, are two very different things. “The essence of being a butler is to make sure everything is in order, from beginning to end,” Keith explains.

A butler doesn't serve at a table, but will notice from a thousand paces that a foreign minister's champagne glass may need refilling---and with the slightest nod to a waiter, it's done.

Neither is a butler a manager. Despite his knowledge of wines, cutlery, cuisine, and etiquette----the very arts of service---he is, in essence, a professional socialiser who's role is both intimate and courteous.

And these two men should know, for they have worked at the very highest echelons of British society, in the fine houses and grand estates belonging to the Duke of Marlborough,the Duke of Westminster, the Duke of Norfolk, and many more. Keith maintains that the British aristocracy are still the best people to work for: “They are down to earth and real, unlike the nouveau riche, who may own beautiful homes, but it's all terribly artificial. One is there simply for show.

Indeed. For discretion, one of the hallmarks of a true butler, can't apply if the employer is incapable of being discrete.

They have also been in the employ of the British royal family, especially Princess Diana and the Queen Mother-----who was famous for her fondness for dry Martinis, public service, and wicked sense of humour.

Years ago, Keith told me, she would host regular parties at Clarence House in London . On one occasion, the Queen's dress designers had been invited, including Hardy Amies, Norman Hartwell, and the like---gentleman all, and all tactfully described as “light on their feet.” At one point, the Queen Mother went upstairs, leaving the men drinking and chatting away. For some reason she couldn't come down at once, and said loudly, “When you queens have finished down there, there's an old queen who wants a gin and tonic up here.”

So, what are the best parts of the job? Or was that one of them?

“When I worked in the grander households, the best part was that you always saw people at their best,” says Keith. “They were either entertaining, or being entertained.”

And if they are saddened by anything, it is the slow decline in standards over the year---from manners to dress code. A leveling out. A dilution of excellence.

However, butlers are not are dying breed; it's the world for which they were originally trained that is the endangered species. As hospitality schools now turn out “professionals” after a mere two years, they are feeding a society that places show over depth, style over form, and noise over music.

Yet true butlers still retain their own code, and their own humour. They can turn things around if it suits them. Take the story of Lady Cunard, of the fabulous luxury liner fortune. One evening, she held a large and important dinner party at which her long-serving and badly-paid butler became very drunk.

Anxious and indignant, she scribbled something on a piece of paper and handed it to him. It said, “You are drunk. Please go to bed at once.” The butler took the note, nodded, swayed a bit, and walked around the table and handed the message to the British prime minister.

They say you should judge a hotel by the quality of its guests. I disagree. I believe it should be judged by the class of its staff.

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