Rotaract Seminar - Leeds

The DG has another job to do for RIBI when her year as District Governor finishes at the end of June. She has already been working on the RIBI Rotaract Liaison Committee this year, and from July she will chair this committee. I will of course become the Consort to the Rotaract Chair, or CORC.  It is important for  the DG to get to know the people she will be working with, and hence Friday 16^th January saw us heading up to the frozen North to attend a regional Rotaract seminar. The meeting was a whole day affair on Saturday, and was to be held at the Cosmopolitan Hotel in central Leeds. As it was unrealistic for us to make the 4 hour drive there on Saturday morning, and then repeat the journey in reverse in the evening, we booked into the Cosmopolitan for Friday and Saturday, in one of their accessible rooms.

                                                                     Leeds

A change of plan was needed a few days before the event, when the Hotel phoned the DG to advise that their lift was broken, and could she walk up several flights of stairs to reach her room? No was the short answer, and  she quickly researched the internet and found us a De Luxe room (more appropriate for someone in my position, I thought) at the Hilton Leeds City Centre, just a couple of hundred yards down the road from the Cosmopolitan.  Daisy was dropped off with the ever-helpful Linda quite early, and off we went up the M1. We stopped for breakfast somewhere near Milton Keynes at a Little Chef, where we both had an Olympic breakfast, which we always enjoy. Continuing our journey North, we drove through snow flurries in Yorkshire as the weather deteriorated and got colder, and eventually we arrived at the Hilton in mid-afternoon, with sleet falling.

                                                                    Olympic Breakfast

There is a multi-storey car park behind the hotel, where guests are normally expected to park, but there were a couple of disabled parking spaces directly outside the main entrance, so we parked there whilst we unloaded the car and checked in. The receptionist said we were welcome to use that parking space  throughout our stay if we wished. I was unsure about that, because the Hotel is quite close to the railway station, and is on a very busy road. I thought the car was a bit vulnerable where it was, at the mercy of late night revellers, or opportunist car thieves. The receptionist pointed out that the car park would cost us £15 per night, whereas the space at the front was free of charge. On reflection, I decided the car would stay where it was.

                                                          Hilton Hotel Leeds City

Having checked into our De Luxe room, which was comfortable although not particularly big (I did wonder what the Standard rooms looked like), we went down to the Leisure Centre to avail ourselves of the swimming pool.  The pool was excellent, and even had a Jacuzzi that you could swim into, rather than get out of the pool then make a slightly dangerous climb into a circular spa bath, as is usually the case. There was also a steam room, which I spent about 10 minutes in, before I couldn’t take any more.

                                                           Hilton swimming pool

Whilst waiting for the lift down to the pool I chatted to a couple from an adjoining room. I know they were speaking English, as they understood me perfectly, but I really struggled to follow what they were saying, so strong was their accent. I guessed, perhaps unfairly, that they were from the North East, as they were obviously not local, and I was sure their accents were not from anywhere South of Leeds. I was glad when the lift arrived to break up the conversation, because I found myself speaking slowly and loudly to them, as one does with young children to make sure you are understood, and they probably thought I was being patronising.

Later that evening we decided to go out for a meal, and the DG did some research on local Restaurants using her Ipad. We fancied a curry, and there was an Indian Restaurant very nearby. However, the reviews posted on the internet were not good, so we looked slightly further afield, and found one, the Tharavadu, with excellent reviews not much further away in a road called Mill Hill. However, when we presented ourselves at the Restaurant, we discovered that other people also research the internet, and we were told they would not have a table for us for another two hours. So we walked on until about half a mile from the Hotel we came across Miah's Kitchen, which had a very modern and bright interior, and also had tables available. In we went, and found it to be excellent.

                                                              Miah's Kitchen

I think I can safely say that in Miah’s Kitchen I had the hottest curry I have ever had. I ordered a Chicken Tikka Rezala, which I have had elsewhere and found it to be fairly hot, but not a problem to eat. This one, however, was super hot. When I ordered it, the waiter warned me it was hot, and said he could ask the chef to make it ‘medium hot’. I agreed to this, and was glad I did. When it was served, the waiter poured a measure of Sambuca over it and set light to it. So it was hot in every sense of the word. The only difficulty that both the DG and I found with our meals here was the size of portions, which were much larger than we would normally expect. We decided it must be a Yorkshire thing, as in previous visits to Yorkshire, we have found portions to be generous.

                                                                              Chicken Rezala

On Saturday morning, after breakfast in the Hotel, I delivered the DG to the Cosmopolitan Hotel for her seminar. There it was nice to meet up with Rod Walmsley, who is the local District Governor, and who we haven’t seen since we were in Alcester last November. I also met Tony Jordan, The local District Rotaract Chair. Having ensured the DG was safely ensconced in her meeting room, I took my leave, as I wasn’t attending the meeting. No, I was going to spend the day exploring the delights of Leeds, a city I had not been to before.

                                                                   Cosmopolitan Hotel

My first stop was in City Square, where there is a statue of Edward, The Black Prince, hero of the battles of Crecy and Poitiers during the Hundred Years War. I have read about his exploits in the Grail Quest series of novels by Bernard Cornwell. In my humble opinion, there is no better historic novelist than Cornwell, who describes medieval battles in such detail that you feel you are actually there.  He also wrote the Sharpe books, set in the Napoleonic Wars. Coincidentally, I live in Bernard Cornwell’s former house, but that is another story.

                                                         The Black Prince

Moving on, with sleet falling quite heavily now, I made my way to the Henry Moore Institute, because I was interested in the work of this famous sculptor. Sadly, it was closed, but next door to it was the Leeds Art Gallery, which had a fine Henry Moore sculpture adorning its entrance. I enjoyed looking around this gallery, not least because it was indoors, and I got a chance to dry out. One of the outstanding exhibits for me was called Rebekah, by Simon Fujiwara. He made several sculptures out of clay, modelled by a girl called Rebekah, who apparently was involved in the London riots a couple of years ago. What made it clever, was that he had made the exhibit look like the famous Terracotta Army.

                                                         Rebekah

                            This exhibit, called 'Song' commemorates Sir Winston Churchill.  (Don't ask me, I don't know either)

Another exhibit that amused me was simply a stand on which people were invited to place slips of paper with their ideas on what would make the world a better place. To be honest I normally shy away from this sort of stuff, where the public are involved in creating ‘Art’. However, on this occasion my attention was drawn to some of the comments. The world would be a better place, someone said, if chocolate was free on Fridays. A young child thought it would be better if everyone had a swimming pool in their garden, another wanted more videos. I think I read them all, some very sensible, some political, and others just funny.

                                                              The world would be a better place if....

                                                        Impressive cafe in the Art gallery

I ventured out again when the weather was a bit dryer and continued my tour, taking in the Carriageworks theatre, the cathedral, and the magnificent Corn Exchange, which is now a fine shopping centre. There are some beautifully well preserved arcades in Leeds, such as the County Arcade, and nearby the Orchard Arcade. There is also the largest covered market I have ever seen, it must cover several acres, and interestingly has different tradesmen grouped together. For instance in one lane there were just butchers. I had a look at the original Tetley brewery (that’s beer not tea) which is now a café and art gallery, then made my way back to the hotel via a riverside walk along the Aire. Near Leeds station is a lock where the Leeds and Liverpool canal begins its journey West. What a magnificent canal this must be, crossing the Pennines en route to Liverpool. I will suggest to my brother Andy that he takes his narrowboat for a cruise along it. He will undoubtedly be grateful to me for this suggestion.

                                           Leeds Cathedral

                                                          Leeds Museum (closed when I got there)

                                                            The Cornmarket

                                                             Cash machine - Novel use of a telephone box

                                                       This lock marks the start of the Leeds and Liverpool canal

When I got back to the Hotel it was 2 p.m. and I got into the warmest clothing I had, and my fur-lined boots. Why? Because I was off to a football match. Leeds United were playing at home today, and I had a ticket to watch the game. There were shuttle buses running to Elland Road from the station, but I decided to walk, because it would only take about 15 minutes, or so I thought. In the event it took 30 minutes, the last 15 of which was spent trudging into the face of horizontal sleet. By the time I reached the ground, I was soaking and frozen, despite several layers of clothing, but the worst thing was that my glasses had misted up and I could hardly see a thing. I wanted to buy myself a traditional meat pie before the match started, but I couldn’t see anywhere selling them.

                                                                Elland Road Stadium

A few helpful locals directed me to the East Stand, and then to the gate I needed (they probably wondered what a blind man was doing coming to watch a football match). By the time I found my seat, my glasses had cleared and the sun was shining brightly. This presented another problem as it was shining directly into my face, making it rather a struggle to see the game until halfway through the first half, when the sun sank behind the West stand.

                                                          Opponents take to the field

I have wanted to come to Elland Road for many years, ever since I saw the famous Leeds team of the 1960s and 70s play at Fulham and at QPR. With legendary names such as Jack Charlton, Billy Bremner, Norman Hunter and Peter Lorimer, they swept all before them in those days. Sadly, they are not quite the same force today, languishing in the lower reaches of the Championship, but they still have amazing support (23,000 for today’s game against Birmingham City) and surely the good times will come again. Incidentally, I found the seating very cramped. I couldn’t sit down comfortably unless I had a knee wedged into the gap separating the seats in front of me. Fortunately I had ladies sitting either side of me who didn’t mind me stealing some of their leg room.  I tried imparting my knowledge of the offside law to these women, as it can be a bit complicated. I had to shut up when I realised they knew it better than I did.

                                                          Almost ready for kick off

Today Leeds went a goal down quite early on, when Birmingham were awarded a disputed penalty, and spent the rest of the game trying to catch up. Two strong penalty appeals of their own were turned down by the referee, much to the anger of the crowd, but finally Leeds equalised with 4 minutes remaining, and the entertaining game finished 1-1. My impression of the Leeds United team, as a seasoned football observer, was that they were good individual players, but seemed to lack confidence. A couple of wins under their belts would work wonders, I felt.  In my view their star player was Lewis Cook, a name to watch out for in future. Strangely, it seems that my opinion wasn’t shared by the Leeds United manager, who substituted him 15 minutes before the end.

                                                          Leeds United (in white) launch an attack

The weather was dry for my walk back to the City Centre, where I headed for the Cosmopolitan Hotel to fetch the DG. She was in the bar with some of her colleagues, and I met Sean Parry, the head Rotaractor in Britain and Ireland and another Rotaractor, called Heather, I think, who was a member of Bromley Rotaract. The meeting had been well attended, with 28 delegates, including several members of Leeds Rotary Club, who actually meet at the Cosmopolitan, offering support.

                                                                     Cosmopolitan Hotel bar

We decided to find a Restaurant on the way back to the Hotel, and opted for an Italian Restaurant, Bibis Italianissimo, which turned out to be a really ‘in’ place. It was full of trendy young people (like us), with lots of large groups sitting down together. It was superbly decorated in an ‘Art Deco’ style, and had quite the fanciest Gents toilets I have seen. Service and food was very good, but we took exception to finding a ‘discretionary’ gratuity of 10% added to our bill. We deducted this from the amount we paid, so although we would have left a tip we didn’t as a matter of principle.

                                                            Bibis Italianissimo

On Sunday morning it was time to head home, but we were stopping on the way at Kislingbury, just outside Northampton, to visit my niece Jacqui and her husband Tom. They now have two children, James (3 years old) and Robin, born just 6 weeks ago. Also my sister Yvonne was over from USA to spend a couple of weeks with her grandchildren, and my brother Alan was back from Thailand and drove up the same day.  Yvonne had brought me a copy of a beautiful photograph she has of our late mother, which will have pride of place on my living room wall. It was good to meet Robin and catch up with everyone. We went out to lunch at an excellent local Restaurant called the Cromwell Cottage, where I had a super Roast  rib of beef with Yorkshire Pudding. All too soon, it was time to continue our journey home, picking up Daisy on the way. Apparently she had disgraced herself in Linda’s living room earlier that day, details of which I had better not mention here.

                                                    From left: Yvonne, DG, James, Tom, Jacqui with Robin, Alan