The post Our Fifteen Minutes appeared first on Life: A Birds Eye View.
]]>Until the first episode of Ibiza Uncovered aired on Sky1, the fact that we were about to appear on a weekly television show hadn’t fully sunk in. Sure, we’d signed on the dotted line of the contracts, filmed the “before” scenes: packing our cases at my parents’ three-bed semi in Sidcup, then another happily skipping out of Harvey Nicks after our last shift. The crew had appeared at our apartment a few days after we’d touched down on the White Isle brandishing conspicuous cameras and big fluffy mics. But it wasn’t until that first Friday night episode went out that the reality of the “reality show” finally registered.By this point we were living diagonally above The Ship Inn, having moved three times already; following our two-week package holiday near The Egg in central San An we spent several fraught weeks at Villa Angelina, although that was the mother of all misnomers, seeing as it wasn’t a villa at all, but a damp, stone-walled underground cave with an icy dribble of an excuse for a solar-powered shower slap-bang in the middle of the living area.This low-ceilinged subterranean dwelling was wholly inappropriate for a couple of lanky six-foot sheilas like ourselves, so we took to crawling about in there like a pair of tipsy trolls, necks craned at awkward angles, constantly cursing as we bumped our heads in the darkness after a boozy night out. It was like a scene from Alice in Wonderland; we’d drunk the wrong potion, clearly. Angelina, the crazy old cat lady who owned it, must have been stifling her sniggers as she pocketed our pesetas after that particular deal.
The darkness in the cave was disorientating too – one day I worked 6am-4pm, and went home to sleep at around five, before waking at seven-thirty and running to work in a blind panic thinking I was an hour and a half late for my 6am start, only to discover on arrival to everyone’s amusement that it was actually still the same evening.
The accommodation situation had clearly become untenable, so it was time for home number three. One day we simply pitched up at work with our suitcases in order to take up Juan’s earlier casual offer of residence in the flat above The New Star, which, it quickly became apparent, was an even worse idea.
By this time Kez and I were working opposite shifts, one of us on 6am to 4pm the other 6pm until 4am, which meant we shared a lumpy single bed and slept on rotation, with one of us waking the other when we finished work. Being employed at The New Star was crazy enough, living there as well….total chaos. Dodgy characters, shady deals, suspect “ladies of the night” regularly passing us on the stairs…hmm, time for us nomadic numpties to move on yet again.
Our fourth and final residence of the summer was, thankfully, much more suitable – a two-bed apartment at the top of the strip, aka the West End. It was very noisy, obviously, but being above The Ship was a huge selling point for us, and at least our neighbours wouldn’t be complaining about us playing loud music.
The Ship was, (and still is, 20 years later), a lifeline for workers on the island. Landlord John and his lovely wife Denise were like surrogate parents to the scores of clueless young Brits washing up weekly in search of jobs and a summer of fun. Their toddler daughter Krystal was similarly adored by us workers. To describe the couple as pub landlords would be a gross understatement; they acted as employers, recruitment agents, agony aunt/uncle, estate agents…you name it, they’d be there with a pint and some sound advice. To us workers, John and Denise were Ibiza’s A-Team. If you had a problem and no-one else could help, they were the go-to gurus.
The homely pub was a constant hub of activity as workers gathered around the noticeboard scanning the job ads, watching telly or reading their phone messages, since none of us owned a scrap of technology : no TV, mobile phone or landline. (Come to think of it, we didn’t have work permits either, but times were different back then).
It was like the local post office, with the added bonus of selling beer. If one of our friends or parents phoned for Kez or I, the bar staff would just shout up to our balcony to summon us down. The same happened when our programme was about to start : the pub packed with rowdy holidaymakers watching the show on the big screen, with Kez and I sat cringing amongst them also watching it for the first time, albeit from behind our fingers.
We shared the apartment with two other London girls we’d met called Sam and Maria, who also got roped into appearing in the occasional episode of Uncovered with us. Being savvy Londoners, we soon had the idea of moving various randoms into our living room for an inflated rent, thereby reducing our own payments considerably, including the bonkers bong-smokers Noah and Kristina, a couple of American body-piercers. It was a bit cosy with six of us in a two-bed apartment, to say the least, and sometimes I’d come home from work in the afternoon to find the door wide open, the flat full of revellers, music blaring and several fully-clothed strangers asleep in my bed.
Anyway, back to our fifteen minutes….
After that first airing we got our first taste of “fame.” Maybe notoriety is a better word. Workers and holidaymakers (or “tourists” as us workers patronisingly tagged them) whom we’d never met began calling us by name in the street, asking to have their photo taken with us (I bet there’s some horrific shots yellowing in many an attic), giving us their varying opinions of our on-screen personas and situations and generally offering unsolicited advice.
At first, we assumed we’d met them before, perhaps after a few drinks, but nope, they were complete strangers just sidling up for a chat. One family of nutjobs practically camped under our balcony for two weeks with a camcorder pointing up at us, filming us at every opportunity as if we were Hollywood stars. A few of the bars gave us a frosty reception, of the opinion that the programme brought the island into disrepute. I reckon the island was doing a good enough job of that on it’s own, thankyouverymuch.
We started receiving calls from various journalists and TV production teams via The Ship’s phone service, with regular exciting messages appearing on the noticeboard, leading to some welcome extra wonga from spin-offs and magazine articles. I flew back to the UK several times over the summer to appear on television shows such as This Morning and The Vanessa Show.
By now, we had several jobs on the go. Kez was propping for Amore Mio, an Italian restaurant in the West End. I was still at the New Star, we both did a spot of flyering and also sold tickets for Cream at Amnesia amongst other club nights, plus I was part of the entertainments team at Manumission. This basically involved dressing up as something ridiculous for the themed parties at Privilege on a Monday night, getting wasted and dancing on stage or mingling with the eight thousand clubbers in attendance, doing such random acts as peeling potatoes whilst sprayed head-to-toe in silver paint (over a leotard, of course) or dressed as a milkmaid milking a cow on a podium. The latter was the safer option, as I nearly gouged a few eyeballs out with that peeler as drunken revellers bashed into me. The week I had to hand out melon which I’d cut up in the middle of the club with a machete was a tad hairy too.
My cow co-star was a guy called Ben, who was really beefing up in his bovine attire. He’d get a bit irritable in the heat of a packed Balaeric nightclub in July wearing that full furry costume complete with huge udders. “Mooooo-ve,” he’d cry as he negiotiated the crowds in his costume. In exchange for creating a spectacle (the only vague requirement of the role), we got into the club for free and could help ourselves to the workers’ bar, plus a small wage. Sweet. We’d do a pre-party parade around San Antonio before hopping on a special disco bus (oh, it was special, alright) and heading to the club for midnight.
I have many memories of those hedonistic nights, my favourite moments involved floating about in the back room drinking a Coco Loco (an intoxicating potion whose dubious ingredients were unknown but the effects were pretty spectacular) and dancing ecstatically as the sun came up through huge glass windows. Then it was onto Space for the Carry-On, where Kez worked for a while handing out fruit on giant platters. Oh, how very civilised.
Space opening fiesta was another stand-out snapshot of the summer. Juan closed the bar, got the New Star team in for free, then the Sky crew rocked up and filmed our day, the joyous scenes of us dancing on the terrace in the sunshine with our fellow worker pals immortalised on celluloid, the many tatty VHS tapes of each episode of the series still lurking in my loft.
To avoid the extortionate bar prices, someone would wrap a load of drinks in a half-deflated lilo and sling them over the wall. The less prepared would simply go “minesweeping” instead, which was the unethical practise of swiping unattended drinks from tables.
And so the summer of ’97 passed by – a heady mix of sunbathing, work, partying and general, off-the-charts high jinks, as only one who’s been to Ibiza can understand. The daytime parties at Kanya, Mambo and Bora Bora spring to mind, to name but a few. Radio 1 parties. The Funky Room at Pacha. PAs from Sonique at Amnesia, Skin from Skunk Anansie at Es Paradis stand out in my mind. The MTV quarry party on the night Diana died. Morgana. KM5. There are so many anecdotes I could share, enough for a book not a blog (if only I could remember half of what happened). Perhaps these are best whispered in person directly into your shell-like, so I can watch your lips curl upwards and your eyes widen.
The overriding emotion, looking back, was a feeling of good fortune. How lucky were we to have escaped the rat-race whilst our mates slogged away at home like London-based lemmings? How lucky were we to be spending our days lying in the sun, working (in the loosest sense of the word), and going to the best parties and clubs in the world on a beautiful island at the pinnacle of it’s popularity?
One of our favourite pastimes was sneaking a peak at our watches and then reminding each other what everyone at home would be doing right at that moment. At 8am on a Tuesday morning whilst people at home were on their silent stony-faced commute, we’d high five each other as we stepped over the threshold into Space.
In 1997 Ibiza was in it’s prime, and so were we. It was the most amazing summer. From May til October we’d made firm friendships, most of which endure to this day (largely through the power of Facebook, which reunited us all, years later).
So it was pretty obvious that as we attended our final closing party and packed our suitcases at the end of the summer, the words on every worker’s lips as we hugged each other goodbye were:
“Hasta luego amigo….see you next season….”
Sam x
Fancy reading my back-story before you go any further? You can find my other blogs at:
www.costaricachica1.blogspot.com
www.samgoessolo.blogspot.com
www.mummymission.blogspot.com
www.worldwidewalsh.blogspot.com
Follow me:
Twitter: @SamanthaWalsh76 (Life:ABird’sEyeView)
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The post Our Fifteen Minutes appeared first on Life: A Birds Eye View.
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Like a cartoon bomb, the lit fuse on our two-week San An 1997 package holiday was getting dangerously close to it’s explosive finale, so it was with great relief that Kez and I finally secured the jobs that would diffuse the tense situation, thus allowing us to swerve the depressing deportation back to boring Blighty and instead providing our golden tickets to a great summer of working and partying (but mostly partying) on The White Isle: Ibiza.
With just a small fistful of crumpled mil peseta notes tucked into the back pocket of my favourite faded Diesels, we’d been a-begging for jobs, cap-in-hand, like innocent little Oliver Twists amidst a sea of Artful Dodgers. Finally the grovelling paid off, and we gleefully tore up our return tickets to Gatwick and strutted confidently along the San An shoreline at sunrise, en route to The New Star to start work.
Eager to impress Juan, our Super-Mario moustachioed boss, we arrived early for our six o’clock shift, at around 5.40am. The previous evening we’d physically forced ourselves to stay in for once: barricading the door to our apartment and resisting the pull of the hypnotic house music wafting up to our balcony and beckoning us down.
We focused instead on selecting the most work-appropriate of the various rumpled skimpy outfits dangling from every available surface in the flat, and polishing up our slightly scuffed sandals – much like any other nervous newbie preparing for their first day in a longed-for job. Only this wasn’t like any other first day in any other job we’d started. Oh no. This was about to be the most memorable first day ever….
So, it’s 5.45am, and all is deserted at the bar, which is what we expected from this benign-looking establishment on the outskirts of town. Leon, Claire, and a few other staff are quietly sipping black coffees, bleary-eyed, as they shuffle about looking subdued, preparing for opening. Kez and I had made a pact on the walk up : to stay together and help each other along, having previously blagged it that we were experienced barmaids, musing
“how hard can it be, eh?”
To our dismay this deal, solemnly sealed with a firm handshake, is instantly broken as Juan stations Kez out at the back terrace bar and me in the main one. There’s also a front terrace with yet another bar. Oh right. We hadn’t realised there were three bars. We look at each other imploringly as she’s led away like a death-row prisoner. Oh well, it’ll be quiet so we’ll have plenty of time to learn the ropes, I think. How wrong could I be….
The clock strikes 6am, the DJs Jamie and Dave fire up the decks, spin some vinyl and the beat of heavy house music fills the air. Seconds later, the doors of the bar are flung open wide and hordes of Duracell-bunny partygoers come piling through, eager to keep the holiday high-jinks going long into the morning after kicking-out time at the clubs.
Within minutes, the queue at the bar is five deep and a sea of thirsty faces surges forward, tongues lolling, eagerly flapping banknotes at us, vying for attention as they holler their drinks orders over the dance-music din. I’m like a rabbit in the headlights, pink-eyed and petrified. I’ve never so much as pulled a pint in my life. I’m about to learn, and quick.
The first attempt results in a pint of froth, the second sees me spilling beer all over me. I wipe my hands purposefully on my clean miniskirt and take a deep breath. I need to style this out. Juan is watching his army of trusty bartenders from a rickety wooden stool at the side of the bar, his beady black eyes boring into me, a lit cigarette dangling from his bemused lips. I don’t think I’m a contender for Employee of the Month.
I bat my eyelashes, bite my lip and smile through gritted teeth as I try to remember prices, pull pints and locate drinks I’d never even heard of (Hierbas? what?) on sticky shelves, through a thick fug of cigarette smoke. I amuse myself with the mental image of Kez having a similarly stressful situation down at the back bar, but she’s got the right idea, availing herself of the limitless supply of alcohol to soothe her nerves. I’m a bit slow on the uptake, but soon have the same brainwave and, following the lead of the other staff, swig a strong vodka limon between serving customers. I start to relax and get into the flow.
Meanwhile, the atmosphere in the bar is getting increasingly raucous. Having mastered the basics, I’m able to a step back and survey the scene : it’s 10am on a Monday morning and it’s what one might subtly describe as “all going off.” There are sweaty bodies gyrating on every available surface, including wobbly wooden chairs and tables, although it’s not clear whether it’s the furniture or the flailing bodies that are the most wonky. It’s a health and safety nightmare.
The sun is streaming through the chinks in the windows and doors to reveal beaming revellers dancing and chatting animatedly, marvelling at their good fortune at passing their Monday mornings partying in the sun rather than back in England (Ming-ger-land?), nose to the grindstone, the post-weekend blues rapidly taking hold. They can’t believe their luck, and the energy is contagious. It’s wall to wall Cheshire Cats in ‘ere.
It’s not just the punters throwing shapes, the bar staff and DJs are cutting some serious rug too. With the decks nestled right up alongside the bar, pounding bass and slow build-ups sending shivers up our spines, we have little choice. We are powerless to resist: the music is entrancing and we inevitably submit to multiple eargasms.
By now the bar looks like a bomb has hit it, spilt drinks, half-empty glasses everywhere, overflowing bins and ashtrays….but one look at Juan and I can see he’s no longer bothered, as he clumsily pours us all another long line of vodka and lime (wodka lima!) chupitos as he jumps up and down.
The staff yell “salut!” over the music and down them in one, slamming the empty shot glasses back down onto the sticky bar and wincing in unison.
He high-fives me and, catching me off-guard, lifts me high into the air, looking wild-eyed and crazy as he declares that I’m his “favourite girl in the WHOLE of San Antonio!” in his unintelligible Spanish accent, planting a scratchy kiss on my cheek through his thick wiry ‘tache. At least I think that’s what he’s saying. I wipe my cheek with the back of my hand and scrunch up my face.
“I take it I can come back tomorrow then?” I murmur under my breath…
The perspiring throng are, ‘ow you say in Eengleesh?…” ‘Avinit LARGE mate!”….eyes closed, lost in the music. I even catch sight of Emilio the chef, the palest squid-skinned Spaniard I ever did meet, shuffling to the beat through the kitchen’s food hatch. He’s having a cheeky dance seeing as there’s not much demand for fry-ups this morning; everyone is far too busy dancing to even contemplate the greasy Spanglish menu.
The crowd fist-pump their approval as the DJs drop one tune after another. The unmistakable opening bars of Nalin and Kane’s Beachball kick in, my favourite tune of the season, and I punch the air whilst simultaneously pulling yet another dodgy pint…
Then Ultra Nate’s “You’re freeeee, to do what you want to do….” really gets our juices going. This track will become another of our anthems of the summer, particularly resonating with us as twenty-something’s who’ve escaped the rat-race and feel that right here, right now, the world is our oyster, anything is possible. It’s like the song was actually written with us “workers” in mind….
Gradually the bar thins out and the volume of the music decreases, until it’s 4pm and only a few straggly hangers-on remain, face down at a table on the terrace, the backs of their necks burnt by the
scorching summer sun, or chatting in tight little groups in the dark recesses and alcoves of the building, cowering from the sunlight, postponing the inevitable painful trek back to their hotel, more battered than last Friday’s fish supper.
The following morning dawns and it’s time to leave for work once more. I hang on as long as possible at the apartment willing Kez to show up, but these are the days before everyone and their dog owns a mobile and she’s nowhere to be seen. Reluctantly, I leave without her, and within minutes of the bar opening, the party is once again in full swing. The place is heaving and we’re a (wo)man down. She finally shows up…seven hours late for our 6am shift. Oops. Manuel is less than impressed, and later, Juan sacks her. The Uncovered crew show up to film us, loving the scandal. After a lot of grovelling, she’s given another chance, although it’s short-lived.
It turns out holding down an eight-hour daily bar shift whilst attending every club night and after-party on the island is no mean feat, even for a couple of professional party-girls such as ourselves. If our work timesheet was as good as our reliable Ammesia or Pacha attendance, we’d be model employees. We clock in and out of Space every Sunday with no problems at all, 100% attendance, impeccable records. No disciplinaries needed for chucking sickies or dragging our heels and showing up late when it comes to clubbing. No Siree!
However, it quickly transpires that we are gonna need A LOT of jobs this summer…
Sam x
Fancy reading my back-story before you go any further? You can find my other blogs at:
www.costaricachica1.blogspot.com
www.samgoessolo.blogspot.com
www.mummymission.blogspot.com
www.worldwidewalsh.blogspot.com
Follow me:
Twitter: @SamanthaWalsh76 (Life:ABird’sEyeView)
Facebook: @lifeabirdseyeview
Instagram: @lifeabirdseyeview
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