What fun the Olympic games were! London looked absolutely splendid, everything worked and while Canada didn’t do quite as well as we all hoped, we matched the total number of our Beijing medal haul. I was there to help make sure the Gold Medal Plates guests had a lovely time (though our event experts Lisa Pasin and Cressida Raffin did all the heavy social lifting and organizing) but ended up having a very cool fortnight myself, hanging out with the likes of Jim Cuddy, Marnie McBean, Adam Kreek and Kyle Shewfelt. We were down at Eton Dorney to see Adam Van Kouverden win a magnificent silver and Mark Oldershaw an unexpected and valiant bronze (two medals in the space of 40 minutes) and though I regret the pork and chili sausage I purchased behind the stands it was a great day in all other respects. We had been in the stands beside the Serpentine the day before when our dear friend Simon Whitfield swam so brilliantly then came a terrible cropper on his bike. His mother and his wife were very brave.
As far as restaurants went, I think my recommendations went down well. Excellent modern Indian food at Trishna. Smashing canapés and cod at the Admiral Codrington. And three unforgettable pub crawls thanks to my friend Dr. Kit Barton, a professor at Regent’s College London who knows more about pubs and beer than anyone I have ever met. We started at Ye Old Cheshire Cheese on Fleet Street, moved on to the Cockpit (a real neighbourhood pub where the bellringers of St. Paul’s cathedral come to drink on Christmas Day). Then across the Millennium Bridge to The Rake (320 different beers and an outcry from behind the bar when someone asked for a Guinness), finishing up in Borough Market at The Market Porter. Dr. Draw was our troubadour, improvising abstract, pagan music on his violin in the ancient lanes and yards of the City and delighting the crowd in the Porter.
The tubes were like saunas, the cabbies grumbled that business was down, but everyone else agreed that for a fortnight London was generous and merry and astonishingly friendly. Everywhere we went in our patriotic red and white, the Gamesmaker volunteers called out “Hello Canada!” and we felt entirely welcome. I wanted the Games to go on forever.