arrival in athens

Again, it's been a while! But I've just had the satisfaction of re-reading my previous blog post and have the slightly smug sense that I called the World Cup pretty well - at least as far as England were concerned. The nation's bloated sense of self-importance on the football field was blown apart once more, and our deified Italian manager was to be found with feet of clay, eventually to be hounded out of the job by the Fourth Estate guttersnipes...

It will be a while before we win a major football tournament - if ever - but I suppose a miracle is always possible. That's pretty much what happened to Greece in the European Championships of 2004, and this is the country I find myself in now, embarking on an Inntravel island-hopping odyssey through theDodecanese - it's going to be special.

But first I find myself in Athens. I love going somewhere - anywhere - for the first time, as there's always so much to soak up. Not just the sights and sounds, but also the 'feel' of a place. Powerful first impressions seem last a long time when I'm travelling, and my initial take on Athens has been entirely positive. It's nothing short of an astounding place, with a palpable sense of history quite literally around every corner - whether it's the looming presence of the towering Acropolis, whose power is undiminished each time I notice it, or stumbling across some magnificently crumbling remains at the end of a narrow street.

Of course, I'd heard tales a few years ago of the city as the smog pit of Europe, gridlocked by fuming traffic, and an utter nightmare to visit. In these post-Olympic days, this is hard to imagine, though I don't doubt that it was true. Today, my first experience was of a gleaming airport terminal and an equally polished Metro system that whizzed me into the main hub of Syntagma with the minimum of fuss and the utmost civility. From here, it was a short change to Akropoli and then a five-minute walk to my modern and comfortable - yet unimpeachably characterful - hotel, the Philippos. After a shower and a beer, it was time to head out and explore...

What I found were swathes of beautiful young Athenians enjoying a typically balmy September night in the tender embrace of the open air. A constant hum of laid-back chatter and laughter filled the streets, and the fantastic al fresco bar and restaurant culture was a sight to behold. My deliberately unfocused 'recce' got me lost a couple of times, but I felt as safe as could be - wandering the lanes as I did, stopping at a streetside taverna for the occasional beer . One such blind alley led me to the square at Monastiraki, and my gluttonous eyes got the better of me as I eyed two Greek fellas' thassanis kebap at a taverna table. Quick as a flash, I was seated at the table next to them and was soon tucking into exactly the same thing. This was washed down with half a litre of ice-cold Mythos beer - all for the fairly palatable price of 14 euros.

It's now 3am local time and I feel as though I could stay up all night, such is the excitement I feel at arriving somewhere new, different and faintly exotic. This would be inadvisable, however: I have lots of discoveries to make tomorrow - I can hardly wait!

the greatest circus on earth

So, le coupe mondiale is finally underway. I can scarcely believe it! The gap between tournaments is so long that I can hardly remember the magic of the previous World Cup by the time the next one comes around. But, sure enough, it arrives on the scene... and, with it, all memories of previous encounters, in far-flung corners of the globe, become vivid once again.

Perhaps more than any other, I recall the wonderfully grainy – and almost

bleached-out and shop-soiled – live footage of Mexico '86; that gut-

wrenchingly triumphal dribble and finish by Maradona, setting an unholy seal on the travesty of the

'Hand of God' infamy. I even remember the cacophony of noise, and the cyclone of ticker-tape, which brought a "pre-Falklands" Argentina side to their home stage in 1978 in the magical – and highly controversial – Buenos Aires final against Holland (I was a mere six years

old at the time).

Oh yes, the memories come flooding back... 'Tardelli's scream' (l'urlo di Tardelli) of ecstasy when he won the trophy for Italy in Madrid, 1982; the monumentally anti-climactic finale that Baggio's impotent penalty-shoot-out misfire brought about at the Pasadena Rose Bowl in 1994; and – of course – the triumph of the world's greatest player, Zinédine Zidane, on his adopted home soil in 1998 – perhaps that was the year the French finally got that 'dirty immigrant'

chip off their collective épaule.

So how can this modern-day version possibly compete with such misty-eyed and rose-tinted memories? Well, only time will tell, I suppose. But it's fantastic to watch history in the making... which is what this surely is.

We should not ignore the fact that South Africa is one of the least-deserving nations to host such a tournament in the first place. It's easy to be fooled by the media spin and the glamour; by the Table-Mountain-touting lap dancer of a country who flaunts her obvious and natural assets to the naive visitor, while hiding her dirty secrets safely from view. But let's not be completely fooled by the media's agenda,

even if we allow ourselves to be temporarily taken in for the sake of the spectacle. The searing injustices of this land wallow not far below the surface, and its catastrophic divisions have got worse - if anything - rather than better, since the fall of the abhorrent apartheid system. This is a country in a dire mess, exhibiting an alluringly painted face.

This land, quite simply, is the most unequal on the planet. It's a nation where

42% of the population subsist on less than two dollars a day; and yet one which has seen fit to spend around 33 billion rand (£3 billion) on a mere football tournament. This, if nothing else, should teach us that something is seriously amiss with the world; and that our collective human values have become utterly mangled in the hunt for fame, glory and greedy showmanship.

But, as they say, the show must go on. And the appalling outrages of its staging (the eviction of the urban poor and the rounding up of the homeless to be dumped into so-called 'temporary relocation areas' and 'transit camps') has not prevented the curtain from rising on the stage.

And what a stage is now set! Superstars such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi and Fernando Torres will compete for the greatest sporting prize on earth, all the while treading the unforgiving tightrope between superstardom and ignominy – a tightrope, lest we forget, that our own would-be megastars are wont to fall off. Indeed, What will befall Ugly Wayne this time around? Will he inspire a bunch of frankly half-decent colleagues to some kind of nation-girding achievement? Or will 'the lads' fall by the wayside, victims of a talentless Italian primadonna of a

manager who couldn't even be arsed to speak English

properly in the first place? Don't get me wrong: I think Capello's done a fantastic job, but it doesn't take much to anticipate the line of enquiry that the tabloids will pursue once the inevitable witch-hunt is underway.

But I'm lucky. I don't much care if England regains some kind of empire, if I'm honest. It would be nice if they made a big impression on the tournament, but this is – I fear – somewhat unlikely. My own personal favourites, if I dare whisper it, come in the effervescent form of modern Spanish football, and the

ingenious unpredictability of Argentina, with Maradona somewhat surreally at the helm.

To be honest, I just love the World Cup for what it is (and what the Premier league isn't): it showcases the very best players in the world, competing at the tip-top-banana level, for the highest prize in sport. What could be better than that? Moreover, there's a fair bit of national glory and pride at stake, too: the fulfilment of a nation's dreams (at least for a week or two) may well rest on a perfectly weighted cross; or a ludicrous penalty fuck-up, for that matter.

So can South Africa 2010 live up to the magical memories of the past? Who knows?... but I, for one, am ready for it. Normal life - apart from work - is pretty much cancelled for a month. And the tournament, as far as I'm concerned, already has its own soundtrack. Forget the wailing of Hansen and the gibbering of Shearer in the studio - the zithering wasp-like drone of the vuvuzelas is letting me know – in no uncertain terms – that this is the World Cup and I had better be paying attention. This is something special.

football fever

It's been far too long since I've been on the old blog – again – but what better reason to pick up the old quill than the arrival of the World Cup? I love this event... proper, meaningful football away from the tedious merry-go-round of the over-hyped Premier League. I love all the fans in their kaleidoscopic colours; I love the atmosphere, and – most of all – I love the games themselves... the best in the world pitting their skills and their wits against one another for the sake of national pride and glory.

Fußball ist wunderbar - bring on the beautiful game!

the deep freeze - in praise of snow

It's been far too long since I visited this old blog of mine, but two things have caused me to take this dusty volume off the electronic shelf and breathe some life back into the old comatose old fecker:

1) My old mate 'Traveller Pete' is embarking on another grand foray into the wide open world - this time for a hundred days in South-East Asia), and cranking his own sleeping bloggarhythms back into life

2) Closer to home, this 'il grande spectacolo' of an 'Arctic Winter' cannot pass without summoning up the old creative juices from the depths of my busy mind. Notwithstanding the media hysteria around the Big Chill (more hype is hard to imagine were David Beckham to give birth to Tiger Woods' lovechild), this experience has been - to me - utterly fantastic... and perhaps even more so for being so completely unexpected.

Of course the dimwits are using it as fools' proof that climate change is a mere fiction (ahem: this is 'weather', not climate, stoopid!); but, even to those of us who realise this is not so, this has come as a huge surprise. We have been led to believe that our winters would become ever milder, ever wetter and ever greyer - certainly here in this middling northern band of our hemisphere. So this pure unassailable white... it's everywhere and it feels like a dream!

There's also an undeniable nostalgia to it all. It transports us straight back to an era when schools seemed to close down practically every other day during deep midwinter. A trick of the memory, maybe, but there really was sledging to be done and plentiful snowball fights to be had. I also imagine the old school boilers were so useless in those days that even a shortish cold snap was enough to send the teachers home with their tails between their legs while the kids skipped insanely through the gates.

But there's also the sheer beauty of it. My in-car thermometer registered -12C this morning as I drove along the York-Malton road to work. Normally this road (the infamous deathtrap that is the A64) is a racetrack from hell; today it was bordered by magnificently wintry trees, glistening and sparkly white from every branch, twig and leaf. The countryside has been lovingly covered by a beautiful white blanket, ironing out all its messy imperfections, and leaving it gleaming and beyond reproach.


And there's also the staying power. Here in North Yorkshire, we've been in the Deep Freeze now since 17th December. That's nearly a whole month! Not for us the all-too-sudden slushy, dirty, slutty thaw as the white turns to a gruesome and sleazy brown. Give me crisp, glassy, icy pavements any day - rather than that greying shit-shaded mushy mess. I know it puts the poor oldies in peril as their brittle bones navigate their way to the local Spar; and I know it's hard on the brickies, the gardeners, the roofers and the builders - whose working lives have been brought to a grinding halt, and - with it - their earnings. But I can't help it - I'm sorry. I love it, love it, love it!!!

It's the child in me, I'm sure. I adore watching the snow fall. The 'little Steve' within me begs it to keep falling - faster, heavier, bigger; let those flakes cover the ground - please! The fearful child in me also dreads it coming to an end: 'no, don't stop; snow now; snow for ever; snow me in'. It's just a pure unadulterated (and what a great word, by the way, in this context) joy. That's what it is: joy at beautiful, mesmerising, uncontrollable nature in full flow; an unbridled eagerness to be 'taken over' and left at the mercy of something that no-one can even cope with, let alone control (certainly here in Britain!).

I would even argue that it changes us. Slowly, imperceptibly, maybe - but it does. To the point when it's not dreary old miserable, unhelpful, stagnant, workaday, selfish, taciturn Britain any more. Something else has taken its place: people go more slowly; they take more care; they worry a little more about each other. Some of them - god forbid - even begin to make eye contact in the street. Occasionally even to complete strangers! Who knows?... if they're not careful, they might even lose all sense of decency and strike up a conversation with someone they've never met before.

These 'crises' (for it surely is a crisis, if we're to believe what we're told) have a disarming effect on us. This 'white stuff'- it seems to bind us, in ways that our false and shallow society can never do. It prevents us from doing the rubbishy stuff as well: the shopping might have to wait; the mad dashing up the motorway too, perhaps. The unnecessary flights to here, there and everywhere might just have to be cancelled. It encourages us to get our boots on and walk; to think; to care about those closest to us, and about those who find things more difficult than we do. More than anything, in some small way, it teaches us to take nothing for granted: there are things we cannot control - the weather, our skidding cars, for sure... but also our lives and where we think they might be taking us. Our life could be snatched from us tomorrow, through one careless fall through the ice, or by a single swerving oncoming snowplough. It induces a kind of philosophical acceptance that nothing... nothing at all, is within our control.

There may only be one word for snow, but one word is enough. It's magic.

feast of sport

This is one of those summer weekends that brings out the sport-lover in me. True, Wimbledon has been and gone, but we have cricket, golf and cycling to gorge on at the moment, and all three seem to be bubbling up to an exciting crescendo over the next few days. I wouldn't call myself a sports fanatic as such - I'm certainly not obsessed with one particular pursuit (I've even committed the cardinal sin of changing my football allegiances, only to change them back again later on!). However, I love a good game of anything really, and when the world's best are doing battle at the highest level, the choice of 'game' ceases to matter to me - to a certain extent, anyway. What takes over at that level of competition is the sheer emotion - the passion and the glory; the pain and despair.

And so it is that some of the best cricketers, golfers and cyclists are currently conjoined in battle with their fiercest rivals. England are, much to my astonishment, in a hugely advantageous position going into tomorrow's fourth day of the 2nd Ashes Test at Lords. They've amassed an enormous lead of 521 runs with four second innings wickets still standing, and surely only they - or perhaps the English weather - could conspire to snatch failure out of the jaws of almost-certain success at this stage? The hero of the piece so far is captain Strauss, but - after the rollercoaster ride of four years ago, the country (well, the cricketing public at least) waits with bated breath.

At a wild and woolly Turnberry, meanwhile, a positively ancient sportsman, and true gentleman, in the form of Tom Watson, leads the field into tomorrow's final round of the Open Championship. With Tiger already chopped out by the cut, and a wealth of links experience to draw on, old TW may just be able to hold off the pack. he certainly thought so when he was asked that very question on BBC Radio on Friday evening: 'That's my intenttion', he stated simply.

And then down in la Belle France, the cyclists are trading blows in an epic battle of strength, stamina and willpower. The lack of drugs stories in this year's Tour has been wonderful to behold - for once, everyone can concentrate on the stars: the bikes, those nutters that ride them and, of course, the true heroine of the piece, France itself. She threw some testing terrain at them yesterday in the Vosges mountains of Alsace, but it was the cold and the rain that really did the psychological damage to many.

Today saw a tactical and political kerfuffle between the leading teams, the upshot of which means a mere eight seconds now separate the leading four riders in the Tour's overall classification (Nocentini and Hincapie are closely followed by the intense personal and intra-team rivalry of Contador versus the returning supremo, Lance Armstrong. Tomorrow sees the beginning of three tough days in the Alps - surely the stages, along with Thursday's individual time-trial in beautiful Annecy and the monstrous ascent of Mont Ventoux next Saturday, which will decide the overall winner. There is truly impressive side-show entertainment for British cycling fans, as Mark Cavendish (the 'Manx Missile') and Bradley Wiggins hold their own with the best, but it is the maillot jaune of the 'classement generale' which offers the ultimate prize, and the glory of an unchallenged finale along the Champs Elysees in Paris next Sunday.

All this, and hardly a mention of football - apart from the usual over-hyped transfer gluttony and hearsay - about which I give far less than a damn. After all, it's summer, so football's off the agenda, and almost off the telly.

appleicious

No, these are not my freshly manicured fingernails. But this electronic appliance, this gadget, if you will, is identical to my new phone - an iPhone, I believe they call it. Without belittling the strength of feeling I have for my wife, Rachel - nor, of course, my devotion to the dog and cat - this mobile hand-held device is, for a while at least, the new love of my life. It is perhaps another big reason (excuse?) why my writing has been curtailed over the last few weeks.

Not only is it sleek and beautiful, but it engages the senses of touch and sight in such a mesmeric - almost addictive - way. Combine that with the mind-boggling array of 'apps' ('Leeds chants' anyone, or Alan Partidge soundbites?) and you have a device which looks like everyone else's, but which feels - and this is the key - utterly, privately and pleasurably one's own.

The beauty of it for me, though, is in the connections it creates. It seems to bring my whole life together - past, present and a massively exciting future. I can pluck snippets of information out of the information super-highway as if I was casually spearing fish from a stream. I can email it, tweet it, post it, share it, download it, upload it, comment on it or ignore it. I can log it, store it, reply to it or trash it. I can use it, abuse it, copy it or paste it. I can skim it, dissect it, manipulate it or even create it. The possibilities are endless and, significantly for me, this mirrors what I feel about life at the moment.

Whether it is simply the process of resurfacing from my illness, the lessons I have learned about myself, or the messages I have been giving my subconscious mind through hypnosis, psychotherapy and EFT - or perhaps a combination of all three - I see the world very differently these days. it is no longer a scary place. It is a place full of wonder and possibilities. It is a place where both good and bad things happen, but where I can create my own meaning from everything that befalls me. My life is full of magic, opportunity and madness (in a good way), and I can't wait for the next instalment.

As you follow the flow of this particular post, you may get the impression that I am somehow suggesting that my iPhone might be responsible for this new-found positive outlook of mine, or even that Apple can bring happiness to the world. of course this would be ridiculous. But then, they're a very clever bunch of people, so who knows?

back to 'normal'

Goodness me - it's almost a month since my last post, and probably 6 weeks since the one before that. I guess it's some kind of blogger's block, but also a seemingly inevitable consequence of 'being busy'. However, I'm not fooling myself and realise I make my own choices these days - after all, what we do and don't do is simply a result of the priorities we attach to them. So maybe I just didn't really want to write for a while? It's certainly true that I didn't need to - not in the way I did when I was finding my path out of the abyss of depression, at any rate. But could it be that I need to write now, more than ever, precisely because I am getting back to 'normal'?

After all, what is 'normal' anyway, and isn't this a state I never wanted to get back to, given how dysfunctional the state I had thought to be normal had become? All this insight, this painful journey of realisation and self-awareness, was not accomplished so that I could merely return to how I was before. I have fought off the demons and the doomsayers in my head to reconnect with the raw feelings that are truly mine, so I can hardly disown them now - it would be like being hauled out of a deadly and foaming sea-swell, only to then shoot my rescuer (and then myself) in the head.

Yes, if I am to move forward (in the longer term) from this experience, then getting 'back to normal' is not enough. It is self-deception of the most dangerous kind. And yet... and yet it is so tempting. I feel so strong, so sharp, so ready-for-anything, so... happy! And when we're happy, naturally we want to stay happy, get more 'happy', even bathe and wallow in this new-found and long-lost happiness. In short, we have stared into the jaws of death, and rejoice to be alive once more, to have rediscovered our vitality.

And this vitality is not a trick. No, it is very real, and - in itself - can do us no harm . But, as with everything, it is what we do with it - what meaning we attach to it - that will determine whether it guides us to a healthy way of living or places us back on the helter-skelter to self-destruction. And the differences are subtle, the margins narrow. Staying on the right side of the line - the depressive's frontier between being kind to himself and piling pressure on himself - is no easy task. It's like having to keep just alongside a fault-line which lies below the earth's surface - impossible to define, uneven in form, and ready to open up and swallow you without warning or pity. We find things that work - maybe yoga, gardening, walking the dog or perhaps spending quiet time alone. But how easy it is for the self-punishing brain to turn these nurturing pleasures into painful obligations with which we can all too easily beat ourselves around the head? It's a funny old game, inhabiting an unquiet mind, and one must always be vigilant. Vigilant and accepting, relaxed and aware - and all at the same time!

So I'm glad to be 'back on the force', as the great Clouseau would say. I'm truly, genuinely glad to be back in a job I enjoy, and am equally genuinely grateful for the love and support I have received from those around me - both from those I know well, and from those who cannot - nor should not - hope to fully understand. The real difference this time around (and this is my one great hope for the future) is that I have gained a true sense of responsibility at long last.

That is to say: I realise that I - and only I - am responsible for the meaning I give to events in my life. I am therefore wholly responsible for how I feel, and if I accept this responsibility, then I will also accept my true feelings and work with them rather than feeling the need to cut them off or conceal them. This should make it easier for me to carry my true self (and especially my more vulnerable, younger, inner self) with me, rather than shutting him out. No excuses any more. No casting blame. No bemoaning my lot. The simple fact is that this is my life, and I am the only one who can live it.

it were 'ot in 'ull

Oh my god... the best part of a month has passed and I haven't applied my fingers to the fcuking, blogging keyboard - not once! Ah well, I've managed a June post after all,and such is the heavy price I must pay for getting back to 'normality' and having to earn a crust through this thing they call full-time work. More on this later, I suspect...

I haven't been completely idle, though, and there are a lot of semi-indecipherable scribbles in my notebook which might - or might not - find their way onto the digital page on some future occasion. For now, though, I'll content myself with a rather simple update on the third of my quartet of races this year - the Humber Bridge Half Marathon.

Like Stockholm last year, it was way too hot for serious running. There were also some nasty and prolonged hills. This took me somewhat by surprise as I had opted for this 'half' under the misguided impression that the banks of the Humber Estuary couldn't be anything other than pancake-flat. The unremitting bastard of an incline which showed itself around the 9-mile mark was to prove me very wrong.

These unforeseen challenges notwithstanding, I was destined to prevail with nothing more than a bulbous red blood-blister to remind me of the suffering I endured. My legs were fine, my morale unsapped... though the heat and the hills took their toll on my body generally, and that evening (plus the following day back at work) was marked by sheer exhaustion. I had targeted a 1 hour 40 minute finish, but - between me, you and cyberspace - I'd been hoping to crack one-hour-thirty. I was nowhere near in the end, of course, but I did better my previous 'best' for a half-marathon by a full eight seconds, crossing the line in 1 hour, 38 minutes and not a single second more.

The day was made all the more bearable through making the unexpected acquaintance of a lovely blonde vulcanologist from San Luis Obispo. I ended up giving her a lift to and from the race (for various complicated an unimportant reasons) and the resulting lessons on the world of volcanoes were certainly an added bonus. Maybe I'll cobble together a post on the subject at some point in the future?... it would certainly make a suitably random topic for inclusion.

Anyway, that's 'Orrible 'Ull done and dusted, with - I have to say - the minimum of fuss. All that remains now is the long, hard slog of training (I love it really) in readiness for the challenges of the Loch Ness biggie in October. I can't say I'm looking forward to it just yet, but I'm confident I'll be fit and ready when the time comes to break for the border. No doubt I'll be pining for the unexpectedly scorching conditions of the Humber Estuary as I line up among the tartan-clad locals outside Inverness. The autumn rain will doubtless be hammering the glens and those gusty northerlies will be lashing around my flimsy running shorts. But I'll be ready for those jocks - bring it on!

on the run in stockholm

In a little under four hours' time, the 31st Stockholm marathon will begin under sunny skies in the Swedish capital. 364 days ago, I was about to begin the 30th such event, and I have some wonderful memories of a truly magical trip.


As excuses for a lads’ holiday go, running a marathon was a pretty radical one. Surely Darryl, Christoff & I could have hit on a less demanding option for quality time together (dry-stone walling or pot-holing, perhaps?), but the decision was made and we found ourselves in the Swedish capital laden with glucose tablets, energy bars and blister plasters.

The weather was perfect. For visitors, that is; not for runners. A steady 26 to 28 degrees meant torture out on the course, but the sun-starved tourist in me was secretly delighted - I would see this beautiful city at its best and, hey, I might even get a tan!

Only the combined terrors of the following day’s race and the intimidating price of beer kept us from a wild first night on the town. Instead, we were happily tantalised by a city which, in spring and summertime at least, radiates all that is good about the civilised world. In Stockholm, everything works, everything sparkles, and everything looks fantastic.

The promised views with which I had lured my mates to this corner of Europe did not disappoint. As a city built on 14 islands, with a further 24,000 close by, Stockholm is notoriously easy on the eye. The same can be said of its inhabitants: after lurching around like zombies with our eyes on stalks for the first few hours, it soon became apparent that the slavering Brits-on-tour look just wouldn’t cut any ice here. By the time we left, we had become nonchalantly blasé about the swathes of fresh-faced and gorgeous bombshells around us.

One memorable day was spent travelling on a hundred-year-old wooden ferry to and from the small island of Grinda. This is a tiny gem in the treasure trove that is the Stockholm Archipelago (inexplicably called ‘Archie Capello’ by my mate Chris - owing something to the new England football manager, perhaps?). If Stockholm in summer is reminiscent of Sydney - all broad smiles, lapping water and long, tanned limbs - then this pure, natural paradise is a European version of the South Pacific: we chugged between rocky outcrops with wind in our hair, sun on our faces and beer in our hands to arrive at a tranquil, pastoral idyll. On Grinda there is nothing to do but stroll, slowly, to the island’s only restaurant for the best seafood lunch you could wish for, served by ever-smiling staff (the island’s only residents) on a wooden terrace with unimaginably perfect views. The Grinda Wärdshus is surely, I thought afterwards, the answer to everything.

And what of the race itself? The sun beat down mercilessly, but the city’s beauty won the day and cheered us home, as did the many thousands of locals lining the route and filling the Olympic Stadium, where a magical last few hundred metres around the track brought the walking dead back to life. Such was the sheer pleasure of taking part in all this, the recurrent thought afterwards was not, as I had expected, ‘never again!’… Instead, I was thinking ‘where next?’

more than a club

FC Barcelona's website proudly proclaims: més que un club (more than a club). Perhaps this doesn't sound like an unusual boast: I'm sure the supporters of Manchester United, Liverpool, Real Madrid, Juve, Benfica and others would stake a similar claim. But in the case of Barça, it happens to be true.

Founded in 1899 by a group led by Joan Gamper, a Swiss footballing pioneer who eventually committed suicide after a period of depression, the club was to become a Catalan institution. It is also the largest club to be wholly owned by its fans (over 150,000 socis, or members), and refuses to carry a commercial sponsor's name on the club shirt, having signed a five-year deal with UNICEF to donate 1.5m euros per annum to the charity.

As a symbol of Catalan pride, FC Barcelona became inextricably intertwined with the region's struggle for nationalism and with Spanish politics in general. A month after the Spanish civil war began, Barça's left-wing president Josep Sunyol was murdered by Franco's soldiers near Guadarrama. Soon, the city was under fascist occupation and, following the war, the Catalan language and flag were banned. Consequently, one of the few places that Catalan could be spoken freely during Franco's dictatorship was within the club's stadium. Even today (especially today, one might say), its two most revered figures are firecely proud Catalan 'nationals': defender Carlos Puyol and new manager Josep 'Pep' Guardiola.


In 1973, a Barça legend was born with the arrival of Dutchman Johan Cruyff. Already an established player with Ajax of Amsterdam, Cruyff won over the Barça fans by revealing that he chose Barça over Real Madrid because he could not play for a club associated with Franco. He also christened his son Jordi, a Catalan name, and inspired his team to an historic 5–0 victory over Real Madrid at the Estadio Santiago Bernabéu in the Spanish capital. In 1988, Cruyff returned to the club as manager and began to assemble his celebrated Dream Team: Bakero, Beguiristáin, Goikoetxea, Hagi, Koeman, Laudrup, Romario and Stoichkov were the stars. Under Cruyff, Barcelona won four consecutive La Liga titles, as well as the 1992 European Cup, defeating Sampdoria in the final with El Gol de Wembley, a bullet-like free kick from Dutch international Ronald Koeman.

Another member of Cruyff's dream team was 'Pep' Guardiola, who, this season - during his very first year as manager - has further cemented his legendary status at the club by winning an unprecedented treble (un triplete historico). By comfortably winning La Liga (including, along the way, a sensational 6-2 thrashing of Real, again at the Bernabeu), and by humiliating Manchester United in the final of the Champions League, he has already emulated Cruyff's greatest achievements in a matter of months. Add another trophy in the form of the Copa de Su Majestad El Rey Don Juan Carlos I ('Copa del Rey' to you and me), and this all amounts to more than a job well done. Small wonder that the celebrations along La Rambla were both wild and exuberant, and that cries of 'Viva Catalunya!' echoed long into the night.

mad men

Mind Week 9 to 16 May 2009

Men and Mental Health

The man every woman wants, we are told, is the ‘strong and silent type’. When we appear weak, we are told to ‘be a man’. If our emotions get the better of us, we remind ourselves pointedly: ‘boys don’t cry’.

Despite increasing encouragement to ‘open up’ and recognise our true feelings, there is still an alarming and widespread stigma attached to all aspects of mental health. People don’t know how to deal with it, so they pretend it isn’t there and hope it will go away. They don’t know how to help and, if they are a sufferer themselves, they often don’t know how to explain it - either to others or to themselves. This ignorance is accompanied by its four ugly sisters: doubt, guilt, shame and anxiety. This, of course, only makes matters much worse and makes us hide the truth at all costs - ironically, the one thing that could really help us.


When it comes to the male of the species, this 'doom loop' can take on another, hellish dimension. The notion of being ‘one of the boys’ defines our interactions more than most of us would like to admit, and we play along with a surface level of machismo and bonhomie. While often perfectly harmless, this can also act as a real barrier to getting our true feelings across, or even recognising them in the first place.

As far as mental illness is concerned, many men simply don’t want to 'go there'. Even if such problems are staring them in the face, they will do anything to avoid them, frequently resorting to violence, alcohol or drugs. The lucky ones are people like me who have been able to find help and deal with their illness in a supportive, caring environment. But there are others with chronic addictions or who lead lives of crime as a futile attempt to escape their own self-destructive thoughts. Thousands more suffer in silent terror, frightened to death of facing the contents of their own heads.

This is why Mind is telling men to ‘get it off your chest’ for their forthcoming campaign. If we can find ways of getting rid of the stigma around mental health in general, and men’s mental health in particular, this will be an important step. Important, too, is the openness with which some are prepared to share their difficult experiences.

Marcus Trescothick, the former England international cricketer is one such example. Having initially put his sudden return home from a Test match tour in India down to ‘personal reasons’ and a ‘stress-related illness’, he was eventually much more candid about his battle with clinical depression. Trescothick released his autobiography - Coming Back To Me - last year, admitting that, in doing so, he wanted to get things ‘out in the open…there have been so many questions left unanswered and I've not helped that process’. In this book, he writes:

‘My mind was pulling itself apart in a hundred directions. Then came the pictures in my head; specific, enormous, terrifying images… I couldn't distinguish between what was real and what I imagined to be real... things, beings, beasts, bastards... attacked in waves, one after another, each worse than the one before. “Oh God, please, make it stop. Please make it stop.”’

Like all other sufferers, Trescothick asked himself why he should have depression. ‘What did I have to worry about? I had always been someone who coped. But depression doesn't care who it attacks; if it wants you, you cannot beat it off with a CV or a bank balance.’

It surely must be one of his proudest achievements that he now appears to have his illness under control. ‘While there may never be a cure’, he says, ‘I have built up strategies to deal with my depression and understand it better.’

The only way to achieve such a breakthrough is through facing up to the truth and being honest with ourselves. Even though men and women experience mental health problems in roughly equal numbers, the tragic truth is that men are much less likely to be diagnosed and treated for it. One in three men with depression and anxiety feels embarrassed about asking for help, and the suicide rate among men is much, much higher. This is why it’s so important for men to ‘come out’ about their mental health and seek the support they need.

running up hill and down dale

York (where I live) is lovely but it is undeniably flat. In this sense - as well as in many others - it's no San Francisco, Porto, Caracas or Rome. While the absence of seven or more hills from the local topography can be a little uninspiring, it's great for views of York Minster... and for running. In fact, you can run all day around York and never encounter so much as an elevated mound. If you feel the need to do any proper hill training, on the other hand, you have to drive halfway to the coast to encounter any serious kind of gradient (which my running club plan to do tomorrow night, the masochists). So why, of all the 10k races to choose from, did I go for Kirkbymoorside? The views, of course: I can't resist a good view.


As the name suggests, Kirkbymoorside grew around a church on the edge of the North York Moors. The moors, being lofty and wild compared to the pancake-flat Vale of York to the south and west, require a bit of getting to. Pretty simple by car, but not so easy by bike or on foot.

So the ten kilometres began with an unforgiving, unremitting pull for a mile or more out of this charming little North Yorkshire market town, winding steadily up to the village of Gillamoor on the very edge of the moors. It was a beautiful day, if a little fresh, and the views were indeed wonderful (yes - all the way back to the Minster!). By this stage, the men had already been firmly separated from the boys and I, along with the rest of the 'boys', continued onward to the equally pretty village of Fadmoor to be cheered onward by a clutch of farmers' wives, a rabble of dogs and a few stray chickens.

From here, it was a glorious descent back into 'Kirby' (or KMS, if you prefer), with the odd cheeky little hill thrown in to dispel any misplaced tendency towards enjoyment. The final, invigorating sprint brought me, red-faced and thoroughly out of puff, straight down the main street amid cheering locals, welcoming pubs and the brassiest of bands. Once greeted by a suitably impressed wife and dog, I downed my sickly-sweet 'recovery drink' in order to counterbalance the dehydrating effect of a couple of pints of Jennings, which were soon to follow.

So that's two of the year's four races out of the way, and with reasonable success (19min 37sec for the 5k; 42min 24sec for the 10k). 'All' that remains now is the Half Marathon across the Humber in June, and then the biggie... along the shores of Loch Ness in the autumn.

...and the power of choice

By coming to terms with the ‘shoulds’, ‘oughts’ and ‘musts’ in our lives and by learning to ignore the insidious voices within, we open up the ability to choose for ourselves, rather than feeling as though we are being channelled along a single-track railway to nowhere.

In order to do this, our thoughts should (‘should’!) reflect reality as far as possible, so we can take responsibility for the consequences of our choices. Sounds easy, eh? The trouble is, we - like everyone else - don’t so much reflect reality as interpret it. As we often discover - either to our amusement or our annoyance - the same event can have completely different meanings to different people, even if their circumstances are the same.

What’s more, the meaning we attach to things is extremely important in determining how we feel about them. So the most powerful and influential way to exercise choice is in our ability to choose how we view reality. Perhaps the most extreme example of this is expounded by Viktor Frankl, the celebrated Austrian psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor, in his book Man’s Search for Meaning. Despite the unimaginable suffering endured by Frankl and some of his fellow prisoners, they were able to find personal meaning and growth, and a way of seeing the world that created value from their experience:

‘…everything can be taken away from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s way.’

This powerful, but extreme, example can be applied to any situation in which we find ourselves, but this requires us to slough off the burden of expectation, habit, conditioning and history. It requires us to live in the present moment and view the reality of a situation as it exists in the here and now. Nor is it mere ‘positive thinking’ (there is something to be said for that too, although I am naturally quite sceptical of the concept). Instead, it involves cultivating a sense of open-hearted acceptance of each and every situation as we encounter it. Only by accepting how things actually are can we remain conscious that we have a genuine choice, and choose the attitude with which to make it.

We are also free, moreover, not to choose. In the medieval paradox of Buridan’s Ass, the animal is located exactly halfway between two equal piles of hay. In being unable to choose one over the other, the ass fails to recognise that he is, in fact, making a third choice - to starve to death.

the tyranny of expectations...

Expectations have a lot to answer for, especially in a society as developed as ours. We are positively encouraged to nurture expectations that are unlikely to be fulfilled, while living in an environment which ensures they will be unattainable.

We expect to be happy, but are fed on a diet of transient, short-lived and addictive pleasures. We expect to be valued, but are treated like numbers in a game and talked to like idiots. We expect to be in control, but we feel like puppets, manipulated by politicians, bosses, bankers, even friends.

Even if we are more realistic in the demands we place on ourselves, society is not. We are expected to be brainy, slim, sexy, thoughtful, eco-friendly, ambitious, healthy, wise, kind, wealthy, brave, strong, smiling, positive, sensitive and fair. It is not clear whether we ought to be all of these things at the same time, although this seems to be the implication. I guess it depends which magazines we are reading or TV stations we are tuned into. And if, by some superhuman miracle, we manage to embody an approximation of all these qualities (as one lovely woman I know does), might that be enough? Of course not! After all, we could always be brainier, slimmer, sexier, more thoughtful… and so this woman suffers from depression and dissatisfaction, just like many others.

As if this wasn’t enough, there are the expectations we carry with us from early childhood into adulthood. Whether we felt the urgent need to ‘be good’, ‘be loved’, ‘be happy’ or ‘behave’, these are the expectations which exert the tightest grip over us - after all, our very existence depended on exhibiting these behaviours when we were small and vulnerable, and when pleasing others was our very means of survival.

So we live under nothing less than a tyranny. I recall that, in my very first therapy session, I attempted to visualise this terrifying burden of expectations in a drawing. I’m no artist, but it was like a huge dark cloud bearing down upon my body with unbearable weight and crushing force. I felt empty and abandoned inside as I finally gave up struggling against the unstoppable tidal wave of domination which had pulverised my spirit. I felt empty, but I also felt a desperate sense of enormous relief in finally being able to give expression to how I felt.

The only way to free ourselves is to slowly and inexorably become aware of these silent imperatives and the contexts from which they emerge, and so to release ourselves from them. We need to be on the lookout for the ‘shoulds’, ‘oughts’ and ‘musts’ in our lives, and listen for the insidious, domineering voices within. Only through this painstaking process can we cast aside the fear of living under tyrannical rule, and enjoy the sense of liberation we deserve.

in the loop

In The Loop is a film which carries a serious message through adopting a frequently hilarious tone. I can't remember laughing at a film so much for ages, but was all the while painfully aware that its creator - Armando Iannucci - knows exactly how the powerful elites manipulate our world, and that, instead of creating a pure fiction, he has chosen to exaggerate a scary reality to comic effect.

There are many great characters in the story (including a brilliant cameo by Steve Coogan as a disgruntled constituent) , but my favourite is Simon Foster (played by Tom Hollander), the gaffe-prone Minster for International Development, who reminds me of Harry Enfield's memorable creation, Tim Nice-but-Dim. The most ingenious line in the film also belongs to Foster when an aide unintentionally interrupts him in the Meditation & Prayer Room at the UN, of all places:

Aide: I’ll leave you alone with your thoughts, Minister
Minister: I haven't got any thoughts. I'm just staring into space while a voice in the back of my head goes 'Oh shit', like a car alarm going off in the middle of the night

the joys of spring

1) New-born lambs in the Dales. I love mint sauce as much as the next man (in fact, I'd wager I love it considerably more than the next man), but seeing the little darlings bleating and frolicking in Swaledale is another matter entirely. Isn't it?

2) Longer evenings. At least when I finally return to work after my illness (later this week), I will be coming home in the daylight

3) A cacophony of birdsong in the trees

4) Feelings of optimism and growth

5) Flowers in the local park

6) The warmth of the sun's rays on my face

7) Running in shorts

8) The sweet smell of newly mown grass

9) Summer is yet to come!

10) Digging out the old Birkenstocks (even if it's not really warm enough to wear them yet)

cafe no8

I've never written a restaurant review before, but then part of the beauty of having a blog is that you can do whatever the hell you like!

If you don't like this place, my suggestion is to get yourself a 'check-up from the neck up', as a former colleague would say. For me, it represents everything that is good about eating and relaxing. It's also an any-time-of-day kind of place, so - once you know it's there - you just have to wait for that 'Cafe No.8 urge' to descend upon you (it will) and, provided you're in the vicinity, you can try your luck and see if they've got a table.

There aren't many of them, mind you (tables, that is). I'd say about seven inside and a similar number arrayed around the delightfully overgrown back garden which lies within spitting distance of York's medieval walls. (Not that you're likely to get spat on here, given the largely genteel nature of the city.)

What the place lacks in size it more than makes up for in quality and atmosphere. While the kitchen itself is hardly large enough to swing a Spanish chorizo, its staff work diligently within its cramped confines to turn out food of consistently mouthwatering quality. Whether you stop by for a quick Masham sausage doorstop sandwich while reading the morning paper, or indulge in a full-blown meal, you're unlikely to leave disappointed.

If more fortification is required from your breakfast (perhaps before tackling a circuit of the ancient walls or hitting York's uniquely varied shopping scene), then go for the Full English, complete with Doreen's black pudding and creamy scrambled eggs. If you've already seen the sights and marvelled at the breathtaking Minster (conveniently situated just around the corner), then this is the place to seek out for a spot of well-earned R'n'R (those time-worn flagstones and cobbles can be hard on the feet, after all!). The daytime menu is served throughout the afternoon and features a tempting array of sandwiches, salads, risottos, bruschette and home-made burgers, as well as a choice of meat or fish dishes - the cod fishcakes with roast cherry tomatoes and smoked red wine, chorizo & butter bean sauce looked particularly tempting.

Yesterday, I took advantage of the 'lunch deal' (any two courses for £11.95, Monday to Friday), taking the chance to relax in the peaceful surrounds of the garden while soaking up the unexpectedly warm springtime sunshine. This proved to be time extremely well spent. To start, the Cafe No.8 deli plate (char grilled artichokes; sun blush tomatoes; olives; fresh anchovies; goats cheese and tomato pate; creamy hummus and toasted bread) made my good mood even better. In spite of the warm weather, I talked myself out of the goats cheese salad, feeling unable to resist the char grilled rump steak with chunky chips, slow roast tomatoes and Madeira sauce. I didn't regret it. The steak was as succulent and as tasty as any I can remember (cooked just to the point of bloodiness - 'a point', as the French would describe it). The hand-cut chips, meanwhile, were a thick cut above anything you would get in the best of Parisian bistrots or brasseries. The Madeira sauce and tiny shallots just brought all the flavours together beautifully, as did my large glass of very acceptable Chilean Merlot.

And that, I'm afraid, was me done. The raspberry and white chocolate cheesecake was, on this occasion, surplus to requirements. As was the banoffee pie and the rhubarb & custard pavlova. A small tip: if you really want to enjoy the cakes here, then pop in during the late afternoon so as not to be distracted by the rest of the menu.

The only drawback this place has is one of its most charming features - its diminutive size. So if you want to bag one of those seven tables in the evening, be sure to call ahead. The service, as you would expect from such a place, is courteous, friendly and informal. They didn't bother bringing my bill out to me yesterday afternoon, leaving me to enjoy my book and the birdsong in the garden. Now that's the kind of civilised, European attitude that we should see more of in this country.

Cafe No.8 - 8 Gillygate, York. Telephone 01904 653074. www.cafeno8.co.uk

memories of poon hill

At 3,193 metres in altitude (around ten-and-a-half thousand feet), Poon Hill is - by my reckoning - more of a mountain than a hill. But then this is Nepal, where the slightest protuberance seems to reach for the sky and where the landscape is viewed on an entirely different scale.

At any rate, it is one of the most famous viewpoints in the world, taking in two of the highest mountains in the world - Annapurna (8,091m) and Dhaulagiri (8,167m) - as well as one of the most strikingly beautiful - Macchapuchare or 'Fish Tail'. Even more impressive to me, though, was the sheer number of dramatic peaks arrayed in front of me, set in a jagged, icy arc across my entire field of vision. Such is the monumental scale of the panorama here that, despite a colossal 5,000-metre difference in height between me and the highest summit, it still felt as though these sublime marvels were almost within touching distance.

And so it is, that during the murky pre-dawn hours of every morning throughout the trekking season, a barely distinguishable line of human forms snakes its way up the hill like a column of ants, torchlights swaying to the rhythm of the climb. These trekkers are on a kind of pilgrimage on which they aim to witness a classic Himalayan moment. As the sun rises slowly to the east, the mighty peaks begin their dawn parade, changing colours by the second as the marvellous views open up.


My own experience of this, during an eight-day trek from the tiny airstrip at Jomsom, was no less special. I was so full of anticipation the night before that it felt like Christmas Eve had done as a small child. I remember having a recurring nightmare that I had overslept and missed the sunrise for which I had been waiting all week. So I was overjoyed to be freezing cold and wide awake at 5am, ready to wrap myself up in whatever clothes I had, before venturing outside the Ghorepani 'tea house' to begin the painstaking climb in the pitch dark of night.

Once at the summit, I could feel the brooding presence of these cold, grey towers of rock all around me, like enormous skyscrapers in a dense city fog. It was a bitterly cold, interminable wait for the sun to appear but, when it did, it lit the mountains up, one by one and shade by shade - first a rosy pink on the very pinnacle, then a gathering orange, then a glittering gold. Finally, a dazzling, sparkling, brilliant white stood out, almost unreal against the clear blue sky. Not something I am ever likely to forget.