Cardiff

I went to Cardiff on Wednesday…now why talk about Cardiff of all places when I haven’t written for weeks?...So long (and thanks to a laptop crash in the meantime) in fact that I couldn’t remember my account name to sign in to the blogspot!...well because I feel like it!

I went to Cardiff for the first time a few years ago…maybe as much as six-seven years ago. It was a work trip. We stayed at one of those soulless hotels for a couple of nights. I remember looking out of the window to this 1970s concrete cube of an office block turned hotel called The Big Sleep and thinking I’d like to stay there next time I come to Cardiff. There is great satisfaction in achieving something small as returning to a city to stay in a hotel that you wanted to. Another tick.

So earlier this week when I was told to be there for a 10 am meeting yesterday, I thought why not go the night before (instead of getting up at stupid o’clock in the morning) and stay at The Big Sleep.

Got there about 9.30 pm…
Grey and chilly…
Station – small but tidy.
A taxi rank with all the taxis in town there at once.
Asked a taxi driver the direction:
A taxi driver hailed from the deserts of Sudan or Ethiopia or somewhere around there…to the greyness of Cardiff.
“Walk to the end of this road, cross the street, you’ll see a crane – red of colour – it’s past that on the right” he said.
“A crane – red of colour” what generosity of poetry for a crane…
On a grey evening in Cardiff

The entrance to the hotel was unpromising but…
Reception – blue and white of colour – was relaxing.
My room on the 10th floor;
A quite city beneath my feet;
Hills in the distance;
Crane lights winking against the darkening sky.

Inside the room – blue and white of colour;
A big bed…
John Malkovich smiling from a huge poster on the opposite wall!
Bass beats coming from the Cardiff Arena across the road,
Jay-Z it was, I learnt in the morning.

I had wanted to have a quiet night,
Away from my usual surroundings and trillion things that have been occupying my head back in London.

Sleep wasn’t as generous as poetry….
It came quickly but didn’t stay long.
Shower in the morning was hot,
Shampoo smelled nice,
White towels were soft and warm.

Breakfast room was pink…
They managed to do pink without girly
And…the best bit?
Crumpets for breakfast…
There were crumpets for breakfast at The Big Sleep!
Put a smile on my face then and all day and on the faces of those I shared the crumpet story with…

Life is simple if we don’t complicate it.
Small things are indeed big sources of happiness.
“a crane – red of colour”…
“crumpets for breakfast”…

We won the project I was in Cardiff for.
Another source of happiness;
But even after that project is done and dusted,
The crane and crumpets will stay with me.