The Friday night session of the Wine Fest in St Johns was, without any doubt, the wildest consumer tasting I’ve ever experienced. This was not – I hasten to add – for reasons of poor behaviour on the part of Newfoundlanders (locally pronounced new-fin-LAND-ers). During those three hours there was such a crush of people holding out glasses that at times I felt like a human Enomatic machine.

I wasn’t sure if the cramp in my fingers was the early onset of tendonitis.

I asked a taster about her interest in spitting, to which she replied: “Dat would be like trowin’ up your dinner.” Fair enough.

Another woman, while tasting The Dark Side, asked me: “If you drink this, do you go to the dark side?”

Quick as a flash the man standing next to her replied: “Let me know if it does, and I’ll take you outside.” Prior to that moment they were complete strangers; what happened thereafter I don’t know, because the next group of tasters was at the table.

Needless to say, Inkspot and The Dark Side were huge favourites, as measured on the basis of the sales from the temporary store that had been set up in the convention centre.

Spare a thought for the staff re-stocking shelves. Over the course of three hours, roughly 7500 bottles were sold. Bear in mind that the store was totally congested space, with queues of trolleys snaked all over. How the staff got through with that quantity of bottles, I don’t know. It’s not as if they could get in with a fork lift, and the overwhelming majority of purchases were mixed cases (i.e. not easy-to-grab cases of individual wines).

Throughout all of this everyone remained calm and friendly. I don’t know Newfoundlanders any other way.

I’m back in Newfoundland, after a series of flights and waiting in airport lounges adding up to nearly 40 hours. If that doesn’t demonstrate both Cloof’s commitment to the market, and my commitment to Cloof, then I don’t know what does.

Getting to North America from South Africa is a lot more complicated and expensive than getting to Asia. On this trip I flew via Frankfurt, partly because I’m presenting a wine tasting in Denmark on the way back, but also because the cost was lower. Did I mention that this entire junket is being done in economy class, without the faintest hope of even a courtesy upgrade?

I’ve previously written about my experiences with an immigration officer in Dublin (read about it here). I suppose if one crosses borders often enough the law of averages will occasionally put one across the counter from charming officials. Yesterday afternoon I found myself handing over a business card to wine-loving immigration officer upon arrival in Ottawa (she was very cute, but I can’t see bullet-proof vests hitting the catwalk anytime soon, even in avant garde collections). It was at this point that I remembered what I’d forgotten to pack; there’s always one item, and this time it was additional business cards.

The craziness of the routing is that we flew directly over Newfoundland from Frankfurt to Ottawa. A direct flight (of which there are none) would have saved five hours of flying time, not to mention the time spent in airports. The closest direct link to Europe is Halifax, which has flights to/from London. However, seeing as one now requires a visa even when transiting Heathrow that option is no longer an option (given the size of the UK’s budget deficit, I suppose they need all the sterling they can grab).

This is my fourth trip to St Johns, where Cape Town’s cold spring days are like heat waves and people have levels of warmth and friendliness that are worth travelling to the ends of the earth for. Even if it takes 40 hours in airline wilderness.

(Get some Newfoundland feeling. Click here to watch a live performance of Rhythm of the Goat by The Navigators.)

I have to admit to a quiet guffaw at the apparently malapropistic subject of a bulk email I received this morning. The posed question “Garnishing orders driving you mad?” is aimed at getting one interested in signing up for the basic financial skills workshop being offered.

Ah, they have it all wrong, I thought. It’s garnishee, and how do they expect anyone to take them seriously if they can’t even use the correct terminology?

My association with the word garnish is from the world of cuisine, as in the dual-purpose verb or noun describing either the act of putting decorative stuff onto a plate prior to sending it out, or the pretty stuff itself (yes, frilly parsley is also garnish of sorts).

Garnishee refers to the process whereby one involuntarily relinquishes part of one’s salary, and garnish is the act of adding something to the plate, which makes this an interesting juxtaposition of words and meanings. A case of giving with the one hand, and taking with the other, perhaps?

Given that the references to ‘garnishment’ appear to be mainly from the Land of Bush, I don’t consider myself entirely shamed. It strikes me as being one of those horrible manufactured words that one now has to accept by virtue of their widespread use.

On the other hand, I willingly submit to having my salary garnished – in a culinary sense, of course.

I was bullied extensively between the ages of 11 and 16 or 17. For much of this time I almost permanently had bruises on both thighs and upper arms. Accompanying the physical abuse was ongoing taunting that undermined every aspect of my appearance, where I lived, my sexuality, and anything else that was the flavour of the moment. It was a truly horrible experience for which I could find neither explanation nor resolution, and which cast shadows over my life for years afterwards.

Bullying (at schools) is in and out of local newspapers on a regular basis. The most recent involved the perpetrator getting quite badly burnt as a result of the victim striking back by tossing a cup of very hot coffee over him.

Eleven years ago, when my alma mater was similarly in the news over a bullying incident, I was moved to writing a letter to the editor of The Cape Times, in which I said:

“Know that bullying is abuse, and that this extremely traumatic experience leaves deep scars in ones’ sense of self-worth, partially because the absence of a logical explanation for the cause of this abuse means that the abused takes on the responsibility (or guilt) for the abuse. When that point is reached, the abuse has come full circle, for the undermining of self continues even in the absence of direct action by the perpetrator. The abused walks through life expecting – like a cowering dog – to be struck at any point. Assertive response becomes paralysed.

“I grappled for years with the reasons why my peers should want to bully me. Not only did I not have an answer, but no-one seemed to be able to help me to prevent it from continuing. The lack of power implicit in being abused is amplified by not being able to do anything about it.”

Several years later my mother asked me a question which at the time struck me as being possibly the most insensitive thing any person had ever said to me. She asked me why I’d allowed myself to be bullied. There were many layers to my immediate emotional response, but the moment of clarity I reached after a little while was that I must have allowed the abuse because it confirmed whatever image I had of myself at the time.

I realise it’s perhaps wrong to cast a victim in the role of having ‘wished it upon himself’, but I do believe that self-image plays a very big role in these matters

However, this insight didn’t quite get me to the point of squaring the circle. That arose a few years later, in 2004, when I took part in our 20-year reunion activities. Anticipating meeting up with old classmates, much of the getting-bullied stuff rose to the surface of my consciousness. I toyed with the idea of distributing a message in which I brought to the bullies’ attention the hurt they had caused me. Eventually I did nothing, and just pitched up for the activities

As luck would have it, one of the old classmates in my four-ball at the weekend’s golf is now the housemaster of the same boarding house we were all in. We chatted about bullying, which enabled me to see that for kids it’s a kind of sport – an unfortunate one – to seek out those who are weaker and to pounce on them. It’s not nearly as personal as I had thought it was. Finally, the school these days operates a zero-tolerance attitude towards bullying, which is widely known amongst the pupils

The implication of this is that victims know that what’s happening to them is wrong, and that there are support structures in place. When I was getting bullied I didn’t feel I had anyone to turn to.

In the months afterwards I bumped into a couple of old classmates who had declined to take part in the reunion, because of their unhappiness about getting bullied (needless to say, I thought I had it much worse than they did). I had a sense that their feelings of bitterness about the entire episode have kept part of their beings forever trapped in that space.

The little boy I was in the late 70s and early 80s will never have the opportunity of striking back in such a way as to forever put a stop to the attacks of other boys. But I do have the opportunity of choosing to live without that umbra continuously bringing fear and weakness into my thoughts and deeds. Meeting up with everyone for the reunion helped me to release the negative feelings I’d carried with me into adulthood

My message to others who’ve been through similar experiences is that this is not a burden that needs to be carried by the victim for the rest of time. If you are a victim of abuse you’ve suffered more than enough already.

Funny things happen to people when they have to make speeches. OK, maybe funny isn’t the best word, but stress certainly has an effect. Even the most taciturn person can ask someone to pass the salt. On the other hand, standing in front of a roomful of people can render them incapable of saying something as basic as “Good evening”.

I am probably the world’s worst conversationalist. Anybody sitting next to me at a dinner is consigned to an evening of excruciatingly boring one-sided conversation. On the other hand, for some weird and – as yet – unexamined reason, I find it easier to be verbal when “speaking in public”. I’m too scared to bungy jump or take part in other extreme physical activities, but I’ll happily stand with microphone in hand without much more than a few key words scrawled onto a scrap of paper. I’m not suggesting that I am a fabulous public speaker, merely that the prospect doesn’t terrify me to a state of rigid silence.

From a caterer’s perspective speeches are both a blessing and a curse. The good side is the break in food service, which enables the kitchen to get organised again for the next round of food. The risk aspect arises with speeches before main course, especially if it’s something along the lines of rack of lamb that needs to be served not only warm, but also perfectly pink. Speeches that carry on too long can wreak havoc with even the most detailed production plans. Having worked in the kitchen at numerous weddings I can attest to the stress produced by a speechmaker who goes on and on … and on and on.

It should not surprise me that solutions to speechmaking problems abound on the internet. Parting with sums as nominal (relatively speaking) as $20 (sorry, $19.97) can get speechless Best Men, Grooms or Fathers-of-the-Bride a wide variety of resources, such as these:

• Weddingspeech4u offers speech packages for just about anybody who has any claims to speaking at a wedding (as if the domain name left one in any doubt).
• Bestmanspeechinsight specialises in speeches for … the Best Man.
• Ultimatespeeches offers pre-written speeches for various members of the wedding party.
• Finally, Publicspeakingsensation (no shortage of hyperbole in the domain name) asks only $19.97 for a claimed 380 minutes of audio-based home study.

Most of my public speaking involves presenting wine tastings. I encourage questions, as this not only involves the audience, but also offers many opportunities for humour. Needless to say, confidence levels (for both audience and presenter) grow with the consumption of alcohol, so the audience participation grows as the evening goes on. It is almost impossible not to have had fun when an evening has been spent in the company of friends, along with food and wine, by which point no-one gives the presentation a second thought.

At some point I, too, will need proper instruction. Until then I’ll keep my audience’s glasses full.

Macau’s Suncity Karaoke bar was the unlikely setting (absolutely no pun intended) for an event aimed at introducing Cloof wines to a group of local food & beverage and tourism players. I say unlikely, because its gold upholstered walls, mirrors and assorted decorative trinkets are not the kind of environment one would normally associate with the world of wine.

I’d go so far as to say that the US legal system could have imposed a more painful penalty on Martha Stewart by sending her to Suncity for five days, than imprisoning her for five months, so far removed is the interior from her design sensibilities.

Once I’d got over the stress of lining up a potential song (in the unlikely event that – to both of our detriment – my hosts pressed me into action) I realised that us wine people have it all wrong. We’re crusading (evingelising) in Asia with a product that is completely foreign, and on top of that, we’re trying to do it all in a Western context.

For starters, the beverage that is most likely to accompany a meal in Asia is tea, not something alcoholic. And, the setting where people are more likely to consume alcohol is a karaoke bar. Yes, wine dinners have their place, but perhaps one would forge common bonds more easily in establishments such as the Suncity Karaoke bar, as distant as they may be – in every respect imaginable – from wine culture.

Nobody did much singing, but they loved the wines!