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Mar. 14th, 2007 06:03 pmWent to prison this afternoon.
We were guests at Haslar Immigration Removal Centre, to see the Mayor's XI play a team of staff and detainees at football. We were held at the main reception quite a while before a guard was summoned to escort us to the pitch. At least we were luckier than Dave, one of the Mayor's team, who'd already been kept hanging on 15 minutes when we arrived! My mother, forgetting we were going into a prison, had naively brought some bottles of wine and cans of beer hoping to raffle them. Of course she had to check them in at the reception. When our escort Pete arrived, Dave was allowed to go to the pitch with us; John graciously delayed the kick-off until he'd got changed.
John the driver reffed; John's wife Glenis, Jan and Michelle all stood with us on the sideline. Glenis kept shouting "Do you want my glasses, ref?" at John; Michelle and, especially, Jan gave the Mayor's team - several of whom were colleagues of theirs from the Town Hall staff - plenty of vocal support. Pete said to me he'd heard we were fielding "quite a few ringers". My mother strenuously denied that we had any! In fact there was one ex-pro, Dave, and two retired semi-pros - the rest were Council staff (including our other driver Pete and his fellow keeper Arron) or employees of a couple of local companies. The Mayor's XI won 3-1, much to Jan's delight - bless her, she really wanted to taunt the watching detainees, who'd been enthusiastically cheering their own team, but she hasn't quite got the hang of being a football supporter. Instead of launching into "You're not singing any more", she danced little jigs while chanting "We're better than you" and "See how good we are". At least no-one outside our little group heard her.
John had arranged for all our team and the Haslar staff to go on to the Kingfisher for a buffet, and sweet chilli, sausages, chicken drumsticks and pieces, and Dim Sum had been laid on for 30. In the end only 15 of us were there - half our own team had jobs to go straight back to, and not one of the Haslar lot turned up - so there was an awful lot of food to go round! Several of us had seconds of sweet chilli, and more than one person exhorted me to keep going back to the buffet and refill my plate, until I was full. There was still loads left over; my mother and Glenis, who were clearly unhappy at all the no-showers, looked sadly at the table and said "Look at all that." I suggested throwing it open free of charge to all the pub's clientele. In the end the landlord lent us all Tupperware and styrofoam containers to take home as much as we could carry. Meanwhile Jan and John both bought me pints of London Pride :))
We were guests at Haslar Immigration Removal Centre, to see the Mayor's XI play a team of staff and detainees at football. We were held at the main reception quite a while before a guard was summoned to escort us to the pitch. At least we were luckier than Dave, one of the Mayor's team, who'd already been kept hanging on 15 minutes when we arrived! My mother, forgetting we were going into a prison, had naively brought some bottles of wine and cans of beer hoping to raffle them. Of course she had to check them in at the reception. When our escort Pete arrived, Dave was allowed to go to the pitch with us; John graciously delayed the kick-off until he'd got changed.
John the driver reffed; John's wife Glenis, Jan and Michelle all stood with us on the sideline. Glenis kept shouting "Do you want my glasses, ref?" at John; Michelle and, especially, Jan gave the Mayor's team - several of whom were colleagues of theirs from the Town Hall staff - plenty of vocal support. Pete said to me he'd heard we were fielding "quite a few ringers". My mother strenuously denied that we had any! In fact there was one ex-pro, Dave, and two retired semi-pros - the rest were Council staff (including our other driver Pete and his fellow keeper Arron) or employees of a couple of local companies. The Mayor's XI won 3-1, much to Jan's delight - bless her, she really wanted to taunt the watching detainees, who'd been enthusiastically cheering their own team, but she hasn't quite got the hang of being a football supporter. Instead of launching into "You're not singing any more", she danced little jigs while chanting "We're better than you" and "See how good we are". At least no-one outside our little group heard her.
John had arranged for all our team and the Haslar staff to go on to the Kingfisher for a buffet, and sweet chilli, sausages, chicken drumsticks and pieces, and Dim Sum had been laid on for 30. In the end only 15 of us were there - half our own team had jobs to go straight back to, and not one of the Haslar lot turned up - so there was an awful lot of food to go round! Several of us had seconds of sweet chilli, and more than one person exhorted me to keep going back to the buffet and refill my plate, until I was full. There was still loads left over; my mother and Glenis, who were clearly unhappy at all the no-showers, looked sadly at the table and said "Look at all that." I suggested throwing it open free of charge to all the pub's clientele. In the end the landlord lent us all Tupperware and styrofoam containers to take home as much as we could carry. Meanwhile Jan and John both bought me pints of London Pride :))
