Ice Dolphins swimming with Tuna

It was a delight to introduce Andy Moss to his first Big Ice Project in Zwolle, Holland at the kind invitation of Huib Joor. Here there are sculptors from all over the world coming together to make a massive ice project. Of course, we landed fashionably late and had to try and catch up with everyone else who had already been there for three days. This was a lot easier to do with the help of Dutch carver Ludo Roders who rushed in to offer us support.

Together we made Dolphins and fish float in the air which was a very technical challenge for us but made easier by my new Japanese fusing saw and silk murderers gloves that give a little dexterity in these tricky -10 Celsius situations. Ice is an extremely strong material that allows you to do extremely dynamic sculptures and optical illusions. Fill your boots Mr Moss. It is only the beginning.

Jamie

Bogota at Night Photographed by Rodrigo Ferreira

The sky is black and below in the mountain basin is a wondrous living creature.  She is breathing.  If I were to take a photograph of her and show you she would lose the life within as you would lose it if I were to take a photograph of you, because when you are there looking at her in the flesh she is sparkling and is totally alive.  I am told the vast lights of the city that stretch to the horizon only twinkle because of thermal currents making their way through the atmosphere.  Whatever the reason, millions of lights pulsating with a rhythm that dances like the eight million people that live there is remarkable. We saw this looking down from the high vantage point of a mountain top called Montserrat onto a city that nestles in a basin two kilometres above sea level.  I have never seen in my life before an entire city before me, in fact I have seen very few things made by the hand of man that is so beautiful.  All these wondrous flickering lights are the sparkle of the people that live there.  It is the city of Bogota.

Taking a Break Photograph by Bouke Atema www.boukeatema.com

This is the place that has no seasons, it is always warm and has occasional rain that makes it so green and full of fruit the whole year round.  Here the air is thin and when you move with haste you have to breathe deeper and rest more.  Here the crescent of the moon has slipped off its hinges and sits not on its side, but on its bottom like a great white smile that reflects the most welcoming smile of the people that live here.  They are indeed one of the friendliest people I have met, and so varied in appearance that the whole country resembles a cosmopolitan city and is welcoming to all, even a red headed Englishman.  This is Colombia.

Chris taming the Cows. Photograph by Bouke Atema www.boukeatema.com

But I am not unhappy to leave Colombia.  There is something inherently warming about the place I am in now.  Here there are seasons, autumn paints the landscape with its wonderful colours and for better or for worse the dark months of winter draw near.  It is cold and wet but wonderfully green.  The crescent of the moon is as it has always been.  When I speak to somebody they understand every inflection of my voice, I can use all words and full accent.  Here there are people that have known me all my life, we have a deep understanding of each other that has been born out of the many layers of shared experience woven through time.  They need me and I need them.  I belong here.  This is home.  This is Yorkshire.

Statue of Liberty and the New York Skyline sand Sculpture by Jamie Wardley. All part of the sand sculpture festival by the WSSA in Bogota Colombia.

Honey Bee gathering up the 'Stolen Honey'

Dan thrust his arm into the dark depths of the engine.  This beast of a vehicle which is a Portuguese military jeep seems to be a cross between a Humvee and a Land Rover and was being a little temperamental and didn’t want to start. I’d just arrived in Portugal to risk my life harvesting honey from Dan’s bees and to make a stone sculpture of my own devise for the first time.  Right now, we’d just finished off the evening with some delicious Piri Piri chicken at an understated restaurant owned by the charming Senior Aurelious.  So much so that he gave us some complimentary Madronia which is akin to Vodka to clean the pallet and help wash down the dried figs that we had as a dessert.  I myself had got so engrossed with the delight of the Piri Piri chicken that I pretty much polished off the shared plate before Dan even got a piece.  I didn’t realise that Dan is one of those people that saves the best until last on his plate, I on the other hand am a little less indiscriminate and have a veil of ignorance when it comes to sharing etiquette and food.  If you put food in front of me, beware.

Dan had warned me about the jeep not starting and keeps a screw driver in it at all times just in case.  It was by this stage dark and Dan could see nothing as he took the screw driver and thrusted it into the engine.  As his arm disappeared sparks erupted from the dark depths and then a roar erupted as the engine miraculously sprang into life.  The beast was alive and it didn’t bite Dan’s arm off.  Hopefully his bees would be so tame.

Psyching myself up for the Bee Encounter

The next day I awoke with trepidation as I knew that we were going to harvest the honey, which is much more like stealing if you ask me.  I feel the bees think the same way as going down to the hives is like preparing for battle.  You don a full white suit that is totally sealed so that the beed can’t get in.  I could see that Dan was a little nervous.  You don’t want to be forgetting the smoke machine or your protective gloves for instance.  Dan was fondling the two hats and trying to decide which to give me.

“Which hat would you like?  There is the square one where the net is kept away from your face, or there is this one that looks a little more cool, but the bees when they attack you can push the net against your skin and sting you.”

“I will take the square one.”  Why even ask?

We drove down to the hives in the faithful jeep and jumped out like commandos, I thought about doing a forward roll but the Portuguese plants are very prickly and I thought better of it.  There in front of us were two blue boxes that at first sight looked quite friendly.  But I could see by Dan’s mood that this was not so and I was not to underestimate the swarm within.  Where is the smoke gun?  Was my suit as impenetrable as I thought?  Earlier, I had been so paranoid about my armour that I had found a small hole in my shoe that looked very much bee size.  I had made Dan tape it up.  I was also wearing a jacket under the suit just in case the bees tried to punch through the fabric of the protective cloth. There is no point taking any unnecessary risks even though I was sweating to death.  Portugal is hot.  But the thought of bees sticking me with their little stings was even more overwhelming, the last time I was stung by a bee was when I was five years old as I attempted to close my hand around one.  It is the most painful experience in my memory .

Dan inspecting the honey comb

With little ceremony Dan lifted the lid off the first hive and was immediately concerned as there was no swarm attacking us.  Nevertheless, always the one to never disregard personal safety I suggested using the smoke machine to chill them out a little. “Oh, yeagh. Good idea” concurred Dan.

It seems that most of Dan’s bees including the queens had abandoned the hive.  Uncharacteristically however, they had left all the honey and so there was definitely something amiss.  Usually, if bees leave a hive they will take all the honey with them and they are remarkably efficient at doing it.  For Dan this was very disappointing, but for me there were still plenty of bees to make it exciting and I was always ready to dispense advice:  “Maybe, you need to use some more smoke Dan?”

We took the hives up to the studio and rested them upon the desk.  A handful of bees had followed and were trundling about the place lapping up all the honey.  Apparently, it now became the bees objective to collect all the stolen honey and take it back to the hive.

The bees taking back the honey

To extract the honey, Dan had devised a centrifugal box that spins the frames so that they honey flies out of the box and collects the honey in the bottom.  This was an arrangement of bunji chords, string wire and a plastic box, very high tech. So much so that after we had erected it we had to go and have a break and lie down after our morning ordeal.  It is a wonder that the Portuguese can get any work done at all in this stifling heat. Perhaps this explains their current economic crisis.

After our siesta and now fuelled by a turbo coffee kick we were all charged up and ready to extract the honey.  Unfortunately, the bees had exactly the same idea and as we approached thousands of them had found the honey and were busy lapping it up to take back to the main hive or to steal it to neighbouring hives.  I of coursed donned my suit, zipping myself up and fixing on my hat and gloves.  Mr Invincible all in white.  Dan on the other hand decided to protect himself only with his shorts and pink t-shirt.  Thousand of bees I say again.  “Awe, they’re not aggressive now, they’re just wanting to take back their honey.  There’s no danger really.”  I nodded my head in agreement in the safety of my Mr Invincible suit.  Yeagh right Dan.

Hard core Dan With the Non-Aggressive Bees

Total disbelief then flushed over me as Dan wearing only gloves lifted one of the frames out of the hive covered in Bees.  Gently, he took it over to the centrifuge plastic box and inserted it.  It has to be said, that nothing is perfect.  But our centrifuge box was much less than perfect.  The spinning bit worked a treat, as the box spiralled around in a circle.  The honey started to extract from the combs under the G-Force as planned.  However, as the plastic box spun out of control the force was so great that the honey rose up the sides of the box seemingly unhindered by the rubbish lid we had on top of it and proceeded to spray over us, the jeep, the motorbike, and the whole studio.  We just needed some milk and we would have been in the Promised Land.  Not to be deterred Danny Boy slowed down the spin and that kind of worked to a degree but was tedious.  I could see Dan loosing his patients and declaring that he was going to jack in all this bee keeping business but I have a feeling that nostalgia will get the better of him.  In the end we opted to just scrape the honey out wax and all and put it through a sieve.  Brutal but affective.  I am also pleased to report that during this business Dan did indeed get stung.  Not because the bees were aggressive, he was right about that, but because they became trapped in the fabric of his gloves.  His arm swelled up like Pop-Eye’s over and over the next three days he winded like a girl.  Love it.

During the rest of my stay the main objective was to make a stone sculpture using all of Dan’s delightful tools.  This will be one of the first stone sculptures that I will have made that is of my own design.

Starting with a block of stone

It’s a wonderful thing carving a sculpture only for the sake of the lines themselves. There is no mission or objective that is greater than the sculpture itself and the lines that it is.  Your only guide is impulse.  This is a very free and pure form of carving.

The rough shape

The texture that the grinder leaves

Of course, with stone, your impulse has to last a number of days as there is no quick remedy to success.  Stone is hard.  This may seem like the most obvious thing in the world to say but it has to be said as stone doesn’t want to chip away so easily.  For four days I cut away with the diamond blade angle grinder and hand chisels, getting covered in dust and breathing through a mask so that I didn’t burn my lungs with the lime.  On the last day the studio was completely caked in dust.  And after all that, I didn’t even finish.  Nearly, but not quite.  There is now a block of stone in a studio in Portugal that looks very much like something but is waiting for my return so that it can finally become.

Final Stages of the sculpture

Jamie

Zara and the Sperm and Egg Sculpture

The flags were flying again over Glastonbury.  This time I had the joy of being at the festival before all the people arrived and was able to enjoy the creative hustled and bustle that brings the festival alive.  This year was also very different to last in that it rained.  It was fascinating to see the verdant hills of Glastonbury in a matter of hours turn to mud as the bulk of the 180,000 people marched in on Wednesday. But nobody was downhearted, it causes great amusement to watch people trying not to fall in the mud and great pride to see that they are not at all deterred by it and in fact embrace it.  The humble wellie is by far one of the greatest pieces of footwear on the planet.  Mr Wellie, or whoever you are that invented it, I salute you.

We were to make a sand sculpture under the creative eye of Zara Gaze and her company Sandalism.  Zara again employed this wonderful concept of a transitional sculpture that grows throughout the festival and we were this year joined by my good friend Dan Glover.  If the Incredible Hulk and Toad from the Wind In The Willows were able to pro-create, the Dan would be the spawn minus the green tinge.  He is hilariously funny and it is such a shame that Toad did not take up sand sculpting as Dan is one of the best.

Mr Toad © Estate of E H Shepard 2004. Licensed by Copyrights Group.

We never gave the sculpture a name but it was inspired by the coming into the world of a little bundle of joy called Huxley who is Zara’s new born baby.  He is just old enough to crack a most charming smile that makes everybody’s hearts melt.  The first phase of the sculpture was to make a group of sperm swimming towards the egg.  Enjoy watching the expression on parents faces as their child asks what the tadpoles are doing and then their panic when Zara gives their child a definitive correction: “….they are not tadpoles they are sperm…” The parents are then for a moment speechless before Zara succinctly gives the children their first sex education lesson on conception and the roles of Mommy and Daddy.  They then leave the sand pile with a sense of contentment knowing that there is now one very awkward conversation with their kid that they will not have to have.

A day or so later this sculpture then evolved into a six week foetus that most people thought was a dolphin.  We even had to write “human foetus VI weeks old”  and still people asked what it was, peoples brains are not working quite as well as usual at Glastonbury, It must be something in the air.  “It was once you my friend.”  After that it then transformed itself into a baby.

6 Week Old Foetus

The final baby finished

But of course the joy of Glastonbury is not the just the sculpture but the music we are able to see and the people that we are able to meet.  We camped next to a new band Ellen and the Escapades and then watched them on the Park Stage shouting “We love you Ellen!” much to their embarrassment.  These guys are very talented, watch out.  The Sushi girls then lined our belies with delicious food, and Shelly and the gang with morning coffee.  We danced and sang with people in the crowd embracing the music come rain or shine, and of course, I got to see my new sister and her wonderful family and friends again.

Dan watching Ellen and the Escapades

But there is one secret to Glastonbury that people do not seem to know about.  If there is one thing that a sand sculptor always has on him then it is a bucket and spade, no matter where he is going.  I even sleep with a bucket as you never know when it will come in handy.  So when we took our blue buckets to the concerts we were the envy of all those around us and naturally spread the bucket love as much as we could.  It’s an amazing feeling being in a concert, the music and the movement of the crowd.  But one thing you do not get is the enormity of it all as you can only see the hundred or so heads around you and that is pretty much it.  Most often than not you cannot actually see the performers on the stage breathing life into the festival through  their music.  You cannot see the 80,000 people sprawled across the fields and up the hill, bobbing up and down to the music with smiles on their faces.  But,…and here is the simple joy of the blue bucket, if you turn it on it’s end and stand on it’s base then you can see everything and the joy of the festival reaches a new level.  I feel a revolution coming on.

Bucket Love

Self Portrait

When I arrived in Rugen Germany a friend of mine Krists Zarins greeted me with a new excellent shovel already sharpened.  This may seem like a small feat, but a sharp fine small shovel is a sand carvers best tool and is pretty hard to find.

This was then added to by the fact that there was a pool just across from where I was living together with a Sauna.

And then just to round it off nicely we were working on a nature reserve and there were deer and hares all about the place.  And the food was great to as long as you weren’t a vegetarian.

It’s hard being a sand sculptor, but someone’s gotta do it.

Jamie

The snow castle and the moomins

The alarm goes off and I wake up with a start.  The light switch is above my head, I look over the way to where Sergey Tselebrovskiy my room mate is sleeping and say “Lights on.”  The light goes on and Sergey announces “Ghood Mhorning in his thick Russian accent which I am glad to say is beginning to have a hint of Yorkshire now and again.

Sergey Tselebrovskiy

On the first morning that we shared the room Sergey then rolled out of bed and proceeded to undertake some sort of exercise ritual right before my eyes, surprising enough to me as it is usually myself that is doing this, but not as soon as I have woken up.  Astonished I watched on in disbelief through my groggy eyes whilst Sergey began to roll his fingers, then wrists, shoulders, waist, knees ankles with unanticipated agility liveliness.  Not to be outdone I quickly joined in and found myself doing squats, 10 press ups and leg raises.  Since that first morning we have for the last two weeks performed this morning ritual together to wake up our ever more ailing bodies in the morning.  It is like performing the children song “Heads, Knees and toes,” even more so as Sergey is learning English and we say the name of the body part that we are exercising:  “Fingers, hands, elbows, shoulders, waist, knees, ankles,” again the squats the press ups and the leg raises.  All of this is of course done in true style as we are dressed only in our underpants. I feel if tickets were available we would have a very nice sideline.

Uldis Zarins making Wolverine, photograph by sandis

For two weeks now we have been making the hotel and I think it has all come together rather nicely.  I was a little perturbed by our schedule and all of what we had to do in the beginning, but it is a credit to the boys, the girl Sue McGrew, and the planning of Jukka Likealickalot that everything has gone very smoothly.  The theme this year was comics and we have had some fun recreating boyhood heroes even if Uldis from Latvia had pretty much never heard of any of them:  Who is this Joker person?   I have been able to play with my moonwalker or Polygon jib again which is a delight as I’ve been able to enjoy the fresh air and views from it which is a sharp contrast to spending all my time in a freezer as in England.  I must say though, I’m not sure the blizzards, driving wind and extreme temperatures are quite necessary, also, why the jib has to sway and occasionally stop leaving me stranded in the air I do not know.

Jamie carving the moomin with the moonwalker, photograph by Jukka

So we will finish shortly and I will prepare myself for the biggest challenge of all which is getting through the mens sauna party on the opening night alive; the Finnish like to drink.  Last year I was so thoroughly intoxicated that I almost fell asleep in the snow on the way home which is a sure way to meet your maker.  Luckily the chap that had spiked my drink with consent was there to wake me up.  How fortunate I am to have such good friends to take care of me.

Jamie

The boys waiting for the boat to pick them up

Myself and Roders have just been in the freezer tent in Holland making our 4 meter T-rex that is undecided on whether it should freeze or melt as the temperature is fluttering between -2 and +2 C.  As a consequence I as any Englishman of our humid Island can emphasise, was thoroughly damp and cold.  But I was not alone in this resplendent condition; there were 30 other carvers from over the world stood in our damp cloths whilst we waited for the special announcement.

“We have a little bit of a situation” said Huib our director, he is of a typical Dutch disposition with his tall height, blue eyes and fair hair.  But he was not standing tall this moment, he was slumped against the table whilst he addressed us, not defeated, but certainly fatigued. “As you know it has been raining hard,” it was this torrential rain that had been causing the freezer tent to be so warm. “It has been raining so hard that the roads to our houses are totally flooded.”  This was not a good thing to be telling 30 people who were hungry and rank with damp, desperately wanting to eat and shower.  “But although we cannot get there by car we can get there by boat.”  The adventure was about to begin.  “…..this has not happened for ten years.”

With the excitement of an adventure and boat ride we changed our cloths and hurried to the cars, driving down country roads to find our passage.  Awaiting us was a boat to take us to the restaurant on the mariner.  But it then dawned on us that our actual houses would be flooded.  Furthermore, my friend Ludo had left her car beside her house apparently now bathing in water.  I hate to say this Ludo, but I won a bet on the whether the authorities would take your car from the flooded area.  They did not and so I won.  Whilst we ate, Ludo managed to drive her car back from the houses onto dry land through the water, apparently not knowing where the road was as it was immersed.

on the boat

But I reluctantly confess that the Dutch are clever fellows even for a country that is even smaller than my own, rather unfortunate if you consider that they are all so big.  They are so clever in fact that we ate our tea with growing enthusiasm and excitement at what was to come with not even a hint of despair. They are used to water problems with all their dikes and irrigation systems, but they have not stopped there, they have even now built the ultimate defence against the risk of flood, in England we try to control the rivers with our clumsy sand bags, but no, in Holland they just build houses that can never get wet because they simply float.

The floating street, madina oolderhuuske

No, it is not a boat or a boat house, it is a floating house, a house that goes up and down in the water and is attached to a simple pole so that it doesn’t float away; that would be very confusing.  When you are in it you can occasionally feel it bobbing around, it has a concrete base, a chimney, a roof, windows, a front door and a balcony.  In fact, it is not just one or a couple of floating houses, but a whole street, with street lights and plants, playgrounds for kids to play in, and instead of having gnomes in the garden they have ducks of all different types; they seem to be having the last quack.  The only real problem with the floating house is actually getting to it.  But the Dutch come up trumps again and just throw another boat in the equation. But then this has not happened as aforementioned for 10 years and the boat driver is not so accustomed to driving his big boat down narrow watery streets, so you can forgive him for crashing it a couple of times along the way, especially in the ‘hurricane winds’ that are the cause of all the rain.

But we sculptors were not perturbed, quite merry after a few beverages and all ready to test our new sea legs, we rallied upon the boat and then searched for our houses in the dark, scrambling upon our balconies with a cheer from our brethren on the account of not falling in the water and drowning.  But now we are all safe in our floating houses, the rain cannot touch us here.

the flood and the floating house

…..two days later.  The water may not have got us, but the fog has.  We are now stranded in our floating houses as nobody will sail the boat in the fog that descended this morning.  We have one pack of muesli, three bananas and a bottle of single malt whiskey between the four of us.  Now the fun begins.

Rationing in the fog

Jamie

I’ve just come back from a Holiday with my twelve year old niece to London and Holland.  We had a great time, saw old friends such as Natalie and her fiancé, went walking around the streets of London, stroked a pelican in St James’s park, said “Hi” to the Queen, went to see the musical Wicked and eat in a swanky restaurant in our trainers.  Went swimming in a lido whilst enjoying the sun with Alan Magee, I got to see my sister and Niel again, and meet my new niece for the first time.  In Holland we stayed with Jennifer and cycled each day, Teigan even fell of her bike whilst trying to punch me; I like a responsible Uncle could do nothing but laugh.  We ate heartily at Martijn Rijerse’s house and went walking with Jennifer’s cats.

But for me the most profound moment I had on our holiday was when a little girl called Anne invited us into her house.  It is down town Amsterdam.  She doesn’t live there anymore but she may as well do as you can feel her presence and that of her family everywhere. You can hear her voice, read things she wrote, and listen to many people talk about her. She was the same age as my niece when she came into the house and lived there for two years.  She wrote a diary of everything that happened there, and it still has a lot of meaning even though it was a long time ago.

The entrance to her house was a little strange.  Instead of a door it was a bookshelf that opened up from a wall.  This was so that nobody would know that they were there. As we climbed the stairs we came into a little room and all the windows were greyed out so that people couldn’t see in so that nobody would know they were there.  Before we went in we bought some drinks and the lady in the shop said to us, “Just keep your mouths closed for two minutes.”  I thought this was a sign of a respect until she continued “…because they had to do that for two years so that nobody would know that they were there.”

There was a lot of people in the first room which was her family’s living room and a bedroom for her father’s friend.  Anne is a now a very popular girl and a lot of people come to where she used to live.  We had to shuffle round the room slowly.  It is strange for so many people in such a small room to be so quiet, looking, absorbing and contemplating. There were a lot of things to see in her house but it was this first room that caught me.  It wasn’t the furniture as there wasn’t any.  Apparently when somebody did find out they were there, they and all their belongings were removed.  Anne’s father Otto on his return some time later said he wanted the house leaving as ‘they’ had left it, just the wall paper and whatever was stuck on it.  On the far wall by the door to the next room there were two pieces of Perspex glass mounted onto the wall to protect what was underneath.  One was a map of France, Anne’s father had placed pins in the map in different colours to show where the allied invasion was; the war by that stage had turned and hope of it ending was real as the Nazi forces were retreating.  The Perspex glass next to this one had nothing in it.  Obviously the item had slipped out or had been removed.  My eyes shifted to look through the doorway, the next room had posters on the walls, it was Anne’s room.  I was ready to move on and then I noticed some grey marks on the wall paper just under the Perspex glass that seemingly had nothing under it.  The light was so dim that it was difficult to make out what it was and so again I almost walked on, but the glass had a description written on it in Dutch and English.  It said ‘A height chart of Anne and Margaret Frank made by the girls during the two years that they lived in the annex.’  I strained my eyes to focus on the marks and saw the pencil lines that would have marked the top of the little girls heads; next to each line was a date and the name Anne or Margaret written in their own hand.  It took me some time to truly comprehend what this meant as I stared.  And then the image of two little girls standing against the wall, one stood there excited to see how much she had grown, no shoes, no standing on toes, but always a straight back, the other marking her height.  You could watch them grow as subsequent marks moved higher up the wall, each with a date and one of their names.

I stared at these simple marks transfixed, then in my mind the image of a white door flashed by, it is the back of the door of our boiler at home that has the same marks but with different hand writing, names and date.  These marks were made by me and my brother when we were children, also fascinated to watch ourselves grow, no shoes, no standing on toes, but always a straight back.  There are even marks of my niece who was in that same room and the same height as Anne.  This is a game that many children play.  Anne Frank didn’t grow much taller than the marks on the wall her and her sister had made because she didn’t live much longer than the last date she had written against them.

I find it difficult trying to absorb the enormity and the atrocities that occurred during the last world war.  It is difficult to comprehend the millions of lost lives and to grasp that each of them was a life.  Visiting this little house helped me to realise this, to really feel that there was once a young girl living here who marked her height on the wall just as we did at home.  Her presence is everywhere through her diary and you really begin to feel you know her, and the more you do the more you grieve as she needlessly died as a victim of the Holocaust.

There are a lot of things to see in Amsterdam, but if you find yourself there consider visiting Anne in her house and let yourself imagine.

Jamie

Jamie and the Jellyfish

My head popped out of the water and I drew breath.  Whilst under I had hit a rock and grazed my shoulder, swimming amongst the jagged rocks at low tide was not the best place to be for a land lover.  As I came to shore Jade, a Scottish lass who works for the festival was just leaving the beach to go back to work.  With her red hair she is one of the prettiest Gingers I have ever met and it always brightened our day to see her beaming smile in the morning.  I stood there in front of her, stripped down to my underpants with a bleeding shoulder and wished her on her way.

Andy Moss and Dan Glover sunning on the rocks in their ridiculous hats.

As beauty walked off the beach I walked on towards my brothers in arms eating their lunch on the rocks.  As I approached, Dan Glover from America and Andy Moss who is now labelled the Mexican, were mocking me as I limped over the shells with the grace of a drunk, Dan then complaining that he couldn’t see on account of the glare coming from my white skin.  But they were unable to mock me deeply as they looked so entirely ridiculous themselves, Andy with his Pink Sombrero and black mustachio, and Dan with his Chinese style peaked hat.  I had a cowboy hat and together we were the Three Amigos.  I put on my hat and laid on a rock in my underpants so that the sun could dry me.  On sitting down I was fortunate enough to catch Dan on a rant: now that he had sampled Haggis he had to take the next step and buy a kilt in honour of his Glover ancestors that came from Scotland and then became plantation owners in America.  Apparently the Glovers were ‘good slave owners’ which is why so many slaves took the name on emancipation; this comment which was meant in the best possible taste led to days worth of relentless mockery from me and Andy.  And his pursuit of a kilt was yet another example of North Americans trying to claw back some culture that is more than 250 years old!  It was so good to have Dan there, we are fortunate that he has such a good humour and was not too perturbed by the choice of t-shirts I had given him, one that was so big it made him look like he was wearing a nightly and the other being so tight that he looked like the hulk in miniature.  But then Dan countered with the fact that the 4^th July was coming up and that we could all jump.

Crail Harbour

It is one of the great pleasures with sand sculpture that there are occasionally moments when people meet from across the globe who would have otherwise not met, and I am pleased to say that I think Dan from America and Andy from Yorkshire are to be lifelong friends. Dan reminds me of the manic toad from Wind In The Willows, he is so funny and has undaunting enthusiasm, whereas Andy is like Badger ready to mock him down and in his words “Outdan Dan.”   I’m not sure if they should meet too often as the resulting dark humour may get them into some trouble.  On his return home Dan was hankered by his wife for his vulgar language.  A real kinship was born in Crail.

Jade applying the finishing touches

As we ate our lunch Craig who is a steward for the festival came to eat with us and informed us that the BBC were waiting for us by the sculpture.  Usually this would cause me to jump to attention, but this day was so bizarre that I was to enjoy finishing my lunch.  Since 8am that morning we had had a frenzy of photographers and news crews streaming all over the sculpture and us one after the other.   I was not to carve anything until four thirty that afternoon.  I am certainly no model but enjoy posing in front of the camera like some Leonardo or chattering my Yorkshire on the telly.  It is always a cringing moment though when the photographers ask the other sculptors to stand aside so that they can take a photo of just me working on a piece of the sculpture that I had not made.  My credit to Dan and Andy for not breaking my legs whilst I was asleep.

Jamie and Graham from the Honey Pot Cafe

But the press frenzy which was reflected in the papers and news the next day was not a reflection of the sculpture, but of the festival it represented and the hard work of Debra Boraston who is the media dynamo for the festival.  It reflected the toil of the whole team who work the festival, many in their holiday time from normal jobs in the pursuit of quality in the arts and the joy of music; a vision I feel of the director Svend and his associates.

The A-Team waiting to catch a train

One thing that I did not anticipate was the hospitality of the people of the village Crail, who embraced us with open arms, Graham who let us dump 20 tonnes of dirt outside his cafe the Honey pot and complained not, only giving us coffee and the best carrot cake in Britain made by Edna; try it if you go there.  And a special thank you to Dorothy, a lady who on our first evening when I enquired “Do you have gravy with Haggis?” replied “Ach no, but you may sprinkle a dram of whiskey over it.”  At this she got up from off her stool and paced over to her house only to return with one of Scotlands finest single malts.  “Enjoy it on your Haggis, there’s enough there for a wee tipple afterwards as well!”  And indeed there was.

Jamie

Quality time with Donald

“I’ve left my passport on the plane.”

This was my conclusion after searching my bag and pockets to no avail.  I had just landed in Helsinki airport but wasn’t too deterred as there were two attractive women sitting at the Finnair lounge just waiting to save my bacon.  I placed my hat on the desk as though I was here to stay until the matter was resolved.

The lady at the desk was bewildered and then hypnotised me for a moment with her magnificent eyes, pool blue with a dark rim to frame the delicate light tones as though she’d gone round them with a pencil.

“……What?”  She had asked me a question whilst I was swimming.

“Where did you fly from?”  She looked up at me directly from her seat .  I regained my composure.

“Leeds, uh, n…., Londo…., ah yes, Manchester.”  My composure had failed me.  “Yes, Manchester.  I was seat 19 A.”  Remembering my seat number immediately filled me with renewed confidence and I could not disguise my pride as a well deserved smirk crept from my mouth.  “What is your name?” “Jamie Wardley”  I remembered that OK.  She smiled.

“Okay, we will need to find it or else you will not be able to get out of the airport, there is security just down the corridor, but then they won’t start cleaning the plane until later.”  I was beginning to feel that I was to spend quite a bit of time in the company of this young lady for all the wrong reasons.  She rummaged around her keyboard and then picked up the phone and began to babble in Finnish.  She got up from her desk and was obviously trying to get hold of the right person, one of her contacts on the ground no doubt.  She then began to pace up and down and I followed her with my eyes which wasn’t a chore.  Occasionally she would give me a neutral glance as if to say all is under control.  And then she went into the back office and everything changed.  She came out pulling all kinds of faces which weren’t encouraging.  There was a slight pause in her babbling so I took the opportunity to give more information:

“…..There was a newspaper on my seat and the passport will be under that.”  This I was sure of.

“What was the newspaper?”

“It was the ….Daily Mail.”  My memory was in overdrive, “In fact there may have been a book with it as well,” my god I was on a roll.  Oh dear, I had left my book.

There was renewed hope in her voice at my new information but then this gradually faded away as she began to pull faces again accompanied by babbling, starring at me with those deep blue eyes as though I should understand something.  This was not good.  I began to fondle my hat still sat on the desk.  There was a bar down the way.  I had only 5 euros.

She pulled a face and with an apologetic grimace said “They cannot find your passport.”  I mumbled an appropriate expletive under my breath at the thought of been an airport refugee, wandering around in the same underpants for weeks on end until a new passport could be issued; and only 5 euros to my name.

And then the other rather more humiliating possibility dawned on me.   I could feel my bag next to my feet.  ”….maybe I have it?” The girl looked at me with a tilted head expressing her thought that ‘maybe you do.’   I leant down and slowly unzipped a pocket.  Three week old underpants and 5 euros were looking more and more appealing.  I had already checked this pocket earlier and was now hoping not to find it.  As I peeled back the fabric there was revealed a clutter of items, wallets, hard drives and a small burgundy book with the emblem of my protector her majesty the Queen of England plastered across it.  Oh dear.  I pulled it out and held it in my hand sheepishly.

By this time the girl with the pool blue eyes had come round my side of the desk and gave a roar of laughter, I indulged in a slight moment of humiliation and then shrugged off my shame and merrily joined in laughing at myself. I’m quite fortunate that I don’t dwell too much on my foolish mistakes as I make so many of them.  Practice makes perfect I always say.  Just before I made my farewells she checked me with her blue eyes for the last time.  I paused to take in the moment and then realised that she was testing me to see if I would remember my straw hat neatly propped on the table.  I had not.   She took it and placed it on my head.  “Welcome to Finland!” she said with delight and another roar of laughter.  How to make an impression by JS Wardley.

I smiled my broadest smile, “Thank you very much.” I was back in my second home.

Jamie

P.s  A sculpture I have made since I’ve been here:)

Me and m'new mate pterry

The Pterodactyl, can yo see the baby tricerotops?