Celebrity Stalking

Following Monday’s unexpected encounter in Pizza Express with David Beckham and family, I got to thinking about some of the “famous” people I’ve met or bumped into over the years. Famous is in inverted commas for a good reason as I don’t include those who are famous for simply being famous.

The biggest name has to be Princess Diana. I bumped into her a few times, once almost literally. Working in and around Knightsbridge for quite a few years gave me the chance to see the glitterati on numerous occasions. The first time with PD was early one morning when she almost mowed me down at a crossing, having run through a red light on her way to the Harbour Club. If I hadn't jumped back onto the pavement maybe both her, and my life would now be quite different. The second time was a year later, this time at the Harbour Club itself, where the Managing Director was showing me around one morning in my capacity as their local bank manager. We walked into a changing room and there was PD, in her skimpies, getting changed. Neither of them batted an eyelid; he apologised and we walked out. Still shocked I said, “was that….?” To which he replied “yes it was”. Tight sods didn't even offer me complimentary membership. And that was the end of that.

Third time was in Montpelier’s, a lovely restaurant close to Harrods. (http://www.montpelianorestaurant.com/default.html) I’d been invited there for lunch by a wealthy customer who was extremely posh but for some reason had taken quite a shine to my East End way of speaking. We were one of the first in the restaurant that day and were seated at a small table, where I spent much of the meal telling my off colour jokes and anecdotes to my host, something she found most amusing. As the place filled out I noticed that people kept looking in our direction. I lent forward and asked if I’d been talking too loud, only to be told that they weren't looking at me but at the person behind me. Not wishing to appear too obvious, I “dropped” my knapkin on he floor and bent down to catch a crafty glimpse of who it was. Well, no prizes for guessing who. She was sitting no more then two foot behind me with a young officer in uniform. I expect she learnt quite a few off colour jokes that afternoon to tell back at the Palace, especially the one about the Irishman and the Prostitute who’d had a curry.

A few of the staff from Midland Bank, Knightsbridge c1982

The final time was in Egypt. After our Honeymoon in Turkey, Irene and I wanted to go somewhere hot but archaeologically interesting. OK, I mainly wanted the history and Irene wanted hot, which is why we ended up in Egypt. Hand on heart, I'd never, ever go back. Horrid, horrid place, full of miserable, insulting, grasping tradesmen and surly people. It could be that my views are coloured by us both contracting Amoebic Dysentery after four days and having to spend the next week within running distance of a toilet, something almost impossible as sanitation seemed to be a foreign concept. Anyway, I digress. The second week of our holiday was in Aswan, staying at the Old Cataract Hotel which featured in the film Death on the Nile.

Old Cataract Hotel. Aswan

By now we had to ensure that after drinking or eating anything we were within 10 or at most 20 minutes walk time to a loo, as liquids took 10 minutes to pass through us and food slightly longer. As I said, horrid, horrid place. Virtual prisoners in our hotel room, unless we went without food or water, we noticed that everything was being whitewashed or painted. Jokingly we said that they must be expecting the Queen, only to be told that Princess Di was visiting later that day. Sure enough, she turned up with a motorcade and was ushered through the crowd waiting at reception. Was that a flash of recognition as she turned to look at me? Nah, surely not.

Oh, almost forgot, I also had sunstroke after visiting the Valley of The Kings, despite being tooled up like Lawrence of Arabia and drinking litres of bottled water. As Jim Hawkins says at the end of Treasure Island, “Oxen and wain-ropes would not bring me back again to that accursed (is)land”.

Of course, we've bumped into quite a few celebs over the years, but they're for another story.