Off to Glasto - but no longer as a 'virgin'

This first appeared in the Bath Chronicle on Thursday, June 23 - the day before Glastonbury.

This weekend I am off again to indulge in Somerset's biggest annaul party - the Glastonbury Festival.

I say 'again' because this will be my third annual trek which means I can now, thankfully, shake off the much sneered at 'Glasto virgin' tag while not yet, sadly, being able to join the league of those oh-so-cocky 'Glasto veterans'.

However, ex-virgin as I may be, from the feedback I received from writing about my pre-Glastonbury fears over the past couple of years I know there is likely to be the odd first-timer reading this now.

They will be looking for reassurance that they have made the right decision to risk life, limb and dodgy toilets for the sake of a bit of music played out in a farmyard.

Well, if that is you and you are looking forlornly at your camping gear and constantly checking the dreary weather forecast, then can I just say, 'relax'.

You are about to have a ball.

A muddy ball perhaps - but a ball nevertheless.

However, I still do know where those fears are coming from.

I remember as a camping first-timer - let alone a Glasto one - sharing my anxieties a few days before my first Glastonbury two years ago. I was convinced that I was the wrong age (40something) and, well, the wrong type of person (don't ask) to lie around in a field of mud no matter how much I was tempted by the music.

But, lo and behold, on my first visit I soon realised Glasto's greatest asset - it's total freedom. This means there is simply no such thing as a 'wrong' person for this party. And that is because:

• It is impossible to be too old.


• It is impossible to be too young.


• It is impossible to wear the wrong thing.


• No one cares a fig what you look like, where you are from or what you do.


• No one cares a fig for anything other than having a good time.


• The toilets are excellent.
  

And only one of those is a lie.

Of course, for all of us going down the no doubt jammed roads towards Pilton it is the music which is the greatest magnet of all and the festival has really pulled out the stops this year to get some top-class performers on the bill.

But, and I can't stress this enough, what will make the trip for so many of us is that Glastonbury is about so much more than what comes out of those speakers. Someone once told me you could enjoy Glastonbury without even seeing a band - I would not have believed it before but I do now because this is a multi-faceted event which provides a unique bonding experience for virgins, veterans, et al.

Oh, and if you are a first-timer and you are really worried about those legendary Glastonbury toilets, then bear this in mind. If you don't like one loo then there are no fewer than 3,224 others to try. Fear not.

So, on with the wellies.

And on with the show.

Glastonbury - an 'ex virgin' speaks out!!!

This time last year I tentatively told readers of my Bath Chronicle column/blog about the nerves I felt as I was about to break my Glastonbury Festival ‘virginity’.

Despite being a big music fan all my life, the ‘tempting’ lure of the big-festivals-in-a-field had always passed me by until last year at the tender age of 45, I made my first appearance in that famous Somerset field in Pilton.

The lure of The Boss (that’s Bruce Springsteen for the uninitiated) was what finally convinced me to get off the sofa and get on the road but as I confided to you all 12 months ago, it was not without major trepidation.

For a start when you get to your mid 40s – especially if like me you’ve managed to avoid camping at all costs – you do realise how much you come to rely on the comforts of life. A night away should involve a comfortable hotel bed – not a piece of ground recently vacated by cows.

And then of course there was the greatest fear for me – The Legend Of The Glastonbury Toilets. I know it may not sound very manly of me but I do think that the private, indoor flushing toilet is one of the greatest inventions of all time (up there with the wheel and DVD boxsets) and frankly sharing this most basic of amenities with thousands of other people from all over the globe appealed not a jot.

My son, who will be accompanying me again this year, once cuttingly said of me “when God was inventing man, I don’t think you were quite what he had in mind” and I realised that this was never more true than when it comes to planning a camping trip in a field where the toilet paper wasn’t on tap and didn’t smell of peach.

But as those of you will know who read my subsequent adjective-laden report after my first visit to Glastonbury, I had an absolute ball. The music was truly amazing but I also came away with the impression that you could have the most wonderful experience, even if you never heard a note.

It is just such an unusual, diverse and appealing community experience where the music is the glue that holds everything together but the fellowship, camaraderie, fun and genuine sense of peace and contentment is just as important.So, having not only survived but I think prospered as a result of my first Glastonbury, I’m off there again this year.

Indeed by the time some of you read this I may already be settled into my stunning one-man tent looking forward to another weekend of music, mayhem and (hopefully) mud-free fields.So can I just say to all the other nervous ‘Glastonbury virgins’ out there about to embark on their first foray into festival fun to just relax and get set for a truly amazing time.

Oh and don’t forget the loo paper (or the sun cream!)

My first Glastonbury - my fears of the loos, the mud and the hippies

This weekend I am about to end my Glastonbury virginity at the tender age of just a tad over 40 (a tad obviously meaning roughly five years).

The fact I have waited so long to partake in the Glasto mud is not because I’m averse to music or indeed festivals - far from it.

As some people know I’m a complete music nut (and many think the word ‘nut’ is appropriate in that I’ve seen my favourite band The Stranglers more than 80 times) and in my younger days I actually organised rock festivals of my own for a number of years. And yet, for some reason, the charms of Glastonbury and the like have never particularly tempted me – until now.

I have been pondering a visit to Somerset’s most famous farm for a couple of years but it was only when I started hearing the mere hint of a two-word rumour – “Bruce Springsteen” – that I thought I simply could avoid the Glastonbury temptress no more.


I adore Springsteen and the thought of not seeing him practically in the backyard was unbearable. So, Glastonbury here I come.

The problem with going to the festival for the first time at a not-quite-as-youthful-as-I-was-before age is that so many other people have been and have told me all the potential problems.

I have been told of mud rising up to thigh level, six-hour car park queues, tents floating away down a hill and even more scarily, that the place is full of hippies. Frightening.

And then of course there are the toilets (pictured amidst the mud here).


Maybe it’s because I am that little bit older now but the thought of sharing what have been described to me as the ‘toilets from hell’ with 170,000 other people brings on a mild form of paruresis (that is shy bladder syndrome) and parcopresis (which is bashful bowel syndrome). I wouldn’t even be keen on using public toilets at somewhere like the Ritz so this . . .

And then, of course, there is this camping lark. I love the countryside but I’ve always believed it is better outside of the home rather than as part of it. It doesn’t help that I am, without any shadow of a doubt, the worst person in the world at DIY and the words “putting up a tent” give me the same fears as other people have about swimming with sharks.

I will be accompanied at my first Glasto by my 15-year-old son, Ollie, who’s far more practical than me, and when I foolishly told him of my tent fears, he looked at me, shook his head and uttered the wounding phrase: “When God invented man, I don’t think you were quite what he had in mind.” Cutting.

Thankfully, however, God has invented pop-up tents and that is how we will now be spending our forthcoming weekend. (If only he would also invent pop-up flushing toilets, we would all be laughing).

But despite the reservations about the mud, the loos, the queues and the total abandonment of personal hygiene, I am still very excited about opening my Glastonbury account. The musical line-up looks incredible (I'm especially looking forward to Broooooce, Glasvegas, The Gaslight Anhem, The Specials, Echo and The Bunnymen, Hugh Cornwell, Spinal Tap and more) and I’m looking forward to catching up with some great new bands, some great old bands and many others who have yet to reach my radar.

Hopefully, I might even see some of you at the event – I’ll be the one in a dodgy pop-up tent, wearing a faded Stranglers T-shirt and with a toilet roll in one hand and a ‘how to survive your first Glastonbury’ guide in the other.

Bring it on Glastonbury – do your worst!

A pleasant kind of toilet humour at the dinner table

When was the last time you went to a dinner party and spent a good chunk of the time talking about toilets?

If the answer is: a) not recently,

b) not ever, or

c) not ever – and, frankly, I would rather put pins in my eyes than do so .. .

... then I can only assume you haven’t (yet!) been invited to dinner by the hugely-charismatic Gill Silversides.

If you are thinking ‘why would I be invited to dinner with Gill Silversides when I don’t even know the woman?’ then I’m afraid this is not a get-out – because nor did I. And yet, I spent last Thursday enjoying a fascinating evening with Gill plus five other complete strangers where the subject of toilets was spoken far more than any of the usual, jollier dinner-table subjects.

It was a sort of Come Dine With Me night with added loo roll.

The reason that I was seated in Gill’s Bath home was as part of a new charity initiative by the excellent Freshford-based charity Wherever The Need to get random people together to enjoy good company and great conversation but also to discuss one of the subjects that none of us really likes to talk about.

The scheme is called Dinner For Dignity and it relies on people such as Gill and her charming partner inviting strangers into their home, getting them to talk about important issues over a lovely meal and then inviting them to make an anonymous contribution for the food which goes directly to the charity and its ambitious plans to bring loos to people who need them.

It is a simple idea but, then again, most of the best charity ones are.

The subject at hand was the startling facts about the number of people who die across the globe because of poor sanitation and the lack of clean toilet facilities. I always remember being somewhat taken aback to read somewhere that only a third of the earth’s population uses toilet paper and it seems that some 2.5 billion people in the world do not have access to what we would regard as a ‘proper’ loo.

If even this talk is making you feel uncomfortable, then imagine how these people feel about this issue every single day of their life.

Not nice is it?

During the course of our meal we were shown a video produced by Wherever The Need about the type of toilets they’re trying to bring to certain communities in India (see pic) , and although you may feel that the sight of a functioning loo while you’re eating your dinner is a bit of an odd mixture, strangely it works.

It was serious stuff but in a fun environment – a genuine case of toilet humour if you like.

So I hope it may inspire others to think about holding their own Dinner For Dignity. If you can cook and can find enough people willing to risk a night with a stranger who might just talk about (ahem) ‘waste disposal’, then just contact wherevertheneed.org.uk.

At your convenience, of course.