My Gay Umbrella

It has been bucketing down here in Brussels for the past few days, and it’s cold too. It’s hard to believe that just a couple of weeks ago we were expiring from the heat. Having lost my handy little brolly in Antwerp the other week, I had to dig out the big golf umbrella I bought on holiday in Spain some years ago. It is a gay umbrella. I didn’t realize it was gay when I bought it. But looking back, it should have been perfectly obvious. Once I realized, everything fell into place. Those friendly ladies at the station. The Dalai Lama was photographed with an identical umbrella recently, but I don’t think he’s gay. I don’t think he’s straight either. He’s above all That Sort of Thing.

Like a Proustian Madeleine, opening my gay umbrella brought back memories of that holiday with Harold in Sitges, just outside Barcelona. I didn’t realize when I booked the holiday that Sitges was the gay capital of Spain. I carefully deposited the guidebook in a waste bin in the departure lounge before Harold had a chance to see it. The leather trousers in Berlin were still fresh in my mind.

We stayed in the 4-star San Sebastian Playa, was expensive but so moi – a “boutique” hotel with only 50 rooms, our balcony overlooked the pool which was secluded and almost always empty. The best restaurant in town, without a shadow of a doubt, was Fragata on the sea front. Its exquisite decor, in a modern nautical style, shows amazing attention to detail. The toilets were a work of art, and even Harold was moved to describe the urinals in minute detail. The clientele was predominantly artistic, if you follow my drift, but this isn’t a problem when you dress like Harold. He was never going to be mistaken for Freddy Mercury.

The late Major was a frightful wine snob and normally wouldn’t drink anything but French appellation controlée. In Spain you can’t get anything but Spanish wine, but we were both pleasantly surprised. Unlike the Rioja that we’d sampled at home which leaves you with a stonking hangover, the wines served in Sitges were pleasant and pain-free, which rather makes you wonder if the Spanish would be so selfish as to keep the good stuff for themselves and export the rubbish? Surely not …

Barcelona is one of the truly great Art Deco cities of Europe, and the minute you arrive in the city you feel the tremendous buzz of a Very Happening Place. Of course I dragged Harold around all the Gaudi monuments, from the extravagant and unfinished Sagrada Familia cathedral to the whimsical Park Guell, up and down the Ramblas, and round the museums and churches.

Having trailed dutifully behind me round all the cultural sights, it was then his turn. Of course there was only one place he wanted to visit – the Nou Camp, home of F.C. Barcelona. We eventually found it in one of the less salubrious suburbs of the city, and I followed him up the steps into the huge stadium which resembles a massive spaceship. Inside is a museum showing exhibits from the history of the football club, which Harold found fascinating. The highlight of the tour is when you come out into the stands and gaze down upon the dazzling green carpet of the pitch. Harold was close to tears as he contemplated the very spot where Ole Gunnar Solskjaer scored that second goal for Manchester United in the 1998 European Cup Final. Hanging about in the museum while he and other middle-aged adolescents of all nationalities peered intensely at ancient pig-bladder footballs and 18^th-century boots with wooden studs, I occasionally caught the eyes of women who had obviously been press-ganged into coming along by their other halves. Dutch, German, French and Italian ladies made eye contact and without exception rolled their eyes to the ceiling in the international language of women, which said “I could be burning plastic in El Corte Ingles right now”. I saw the girls again later in the gift shop, yawning as they helped Piet, Hans, Jean-Pierre and Gianni decide between the long-sleeved away strip or the Barça baseball cap. Nothing unites women of all nations like football.

Back in Sitges, Harold treated himself to a pair of trendy sandals which he’d seen lots of other chaps wearing. Too late, he realized they were worn by the chaps with big moustaches and tight T-shirts going around in twos. I told him not to worry, as long as he kept his Barça socks on he wasn’t likely to run into trouble.