Comments on: I am on holiday

By: camberwell yard vine

camberwell yard vine — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 12:52:34 +0000

The house up for sale on ( I may now be out of date, 2 weeks or so ago ) corner of Denman Rd & Lyndhurst Grove, had a small crop of hops coming over the wall last year, have not looked this year.

bob

By: Dagmar

Dagmar — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 21:43:33 +0000

That pub near that park had a jazz trio, they were good, really ideal for pubs. That big park, that’s being regenerated with big money, whatsitcalled? . Between the Junction and New Road. The sand in the sandpit was always the best in London, it looked like it was made from gold and felt like the finest silk.

Radio 3 has just had Charlie Mingus on, the really intelligent, complex modernist jazz composer and bass player. People who like jazz are often dull, but the music itself can be as rich and promising as the bouilliabaise of Marseille itself.

By: eusebiovic

eusebiovic — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 16:48:43 +0000

My local is The Cambria

Literally a 1 minute walk from my door!

It’s looking good the food has certainly improved and the garden is great — not too sure about the interior decor though, it’s a bit dark…

By the way just who are these mysterious persons who seem to like Jazz? Are they like the gideons? Everywhere yet you can never meet one for love nor money?

Hmmmmmmmm.….

By: PeteW

PeteW — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 16:41:33 +0000

Lovely verse. The Dark Horse staff are — in the main — very pretty, it’s true.

I’m particularly impressed you got something to rhyme with “Marseille”.

By: Dagmar

Dagmar — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 16:11:21 +0000

MARSEILLE LE SOIR

Dark horse doomed?
Incompetent staff, but pretty.
Who wants accuracy?
We are dreamers,
Not actuaries.

Hashish, wine, divine…
Tumbleweed-blown,
Fire-cursed Thai place,
Is she still there?
I ache to this day.

Popular, poor but boozy
Students, decidedly shabby,
But drunk, perhaps happy.
Camberwell has no pareil,
Except maybe Marseille.

By: JohnnyM

JohnnyM — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:57:42 +0000

I spent a couple of months down there (La Ciotat, just down the road from Marseille) once upon a time. Occitan music is pretty popular too — Massilia Sound System were faves with the locals. They were also very keen on smoking weed all day and listening to Bob Marley. And all the wee towns nearby are run by the Far Right. And pastis is horrible. I didn’t really like the place.

By: PeteW

PeteW — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:56:15 +0000

Going back to no.79 — does this mean the Dark Horse in its current incarnation is doomed? I really hope not. The idea of a “cafe/late night venue” fills me with dread. While the staff at the DH can be hit and miss in their competence, I think the chef is truly good. A couple of the dishes I’ve had there in the past wouldn’t have prompted a complaint in a Michelin-starred place. Their wine is uniformly awful, though.

I’m starting to get depressed about Camberwell. There’s a whole series of places I loved when I first moved here in 2005 which are defunct and have been replaced by inferior alternatives:

- The crazy but great Spanish-run “bistro” place on Denmark Hill, nr the Coldharbour Lane junction. Now the tumbleweed-blown, fire cursed Thai place.

- BRB, with its pizzas and popular-with-poor-and-boozy-students two-for-one bottle of wine offers. Now the truly dire Grove.

- The old incarnation of the Castle. Now plagued by permanent TV and music noise and with its decor looking decidedly shabby.

I’m sure there’s others I can’t recall right now. I guess we do have the Bear and Caravaggio, but I’d be sad to lose the Dark Horse.

By: Robbo

Robbo — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:37:29 +0000

Monday nights at the Cambria is jazz night, already has a following and with a special fixed price of £10.00 for dinner and a bottle of michalob/or a glass of wine we had a great night last week.With a diffrent vocalist each week it’s never boring..

By: Dagmar

Dagmar — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:19:43 +0000

You have loosened, liberated, unleashed some louche, licentiousness of the spirit in us, Hannah. Why don’t we all jump the Orient Express when it next passes through Camberwell and ride down to Marseille (it will go there if we insist) and live like Rimbaud and Verlaine till the money runs out?

By: Hannah

Hannah — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 14:19:13 +0000

Marseille was great. Everyone warned me it had a dodgy reputation but i didn’t see it really. In fact it reminded me in some parts of London — the groups of north African lads hanging around the back streets could be a little intimidating but not dangerous. The only time we were a little intimidated was the first night getting lost in Le Panier — no street lights and winding back streets and crumbling houses that felt a little like Naples in the 1930’s

In fact it was the first mainland European city i’ve been to that reminded me of London in someways, it had the same energy and “take it or leave it” brashness.