1985 Singles # 47 Talk Talk

  Also a journal of my year in 1985 when I worked in a Swiss Hotel run by the Swiss Council of Churches in Locarno, Ticino. Then in the Autumn went to University at UEA in Norwich.

I worked for six months between January and June of 1985 in a hotel in Locarno, Switzerland set up as a guest home for priests and their spouses from all over Europe, (chiefly the former Iron Bloc), to stay without payment for a month. Three meals a day, excursions and theme evenings, boules on the terrace and songs in the evening in the dining and living room areas. It was a miraculous place and experience looking back, it certainly was to work in in return for a basic wage. And it must have been wonderful for the guests who stayed there free of charge. Established on incredible values of reconciliation and harmony. Built on Christian values but beyond that loving, peaceful and enlightened ones.

I worked there, in the Wash Kitchen, in the House and in Service as part of a monthly rotation process as part of small teams successively with Agnes,  Hennie and Jytte three of the Danish girls. Also with Holger, a cooler than cool German guy, a good musician and a poetic soul. Sadly he left a few weeks in after we'd done the Gross Putsch the Casa required before the first guests arrived at the end of January. But he came back and a cool romance ignited between him and Franziska, the German girl and probably the best friend I made during my time in Locarno.

. The Manager of the Casa and Haki the kitchen and cleaning manager sussed me and my lack of organisational skills out early and I wasn't allowed to work in the kitchen during my stay there. Probably for the best. I did alright elsewhere. It was just me and six beautiful young women, Haki and Frau Keller the manager. A German, Four Danes and an English girl. A quite blissful experience in every respect. and a golden refuge since then a safe place for me to go back to in bad times. A treasure trove to draw on whenever I need it. Still. Forty years on. 

On Saturday evenings some of us would often head down the slope from the Casa into town to the Italian Disco in Locarno. It had a dance floor encased in mirrors where the young Italian playboys would preen, entranced by their own reflections.Quite oblivious to the astonishing beauty of the young women they and I were with. I didn't look at the mirrors.Why would you? 

There are certain songs I remember which they played week in week out. Simple Minds 'Don't You Forget About Me, Bryan Adam's Run To Me. And this. They're the ones I recall. This, like the others came out in 1985. The first chapter of Talk Talk's reinvention. From New Romantic also rans towards the imperial phase.of their great mythical albums, 

I just need to hear the bassline still and I'm back there. 19 years old. On the dancefloor. With Jytte, Franziska, Agnes and Helle. Young. And happy.