|
response : ten london minutes
Barefoot Doctor
As an author, broadcaster and urban warrior, the Barefoot
Doctor has inspired others through his unique brand of spiritual healing
and wayward Taoism. From his successful self help books, website (www.barefootdoctorworld.me.uk)
and ever popular column in the Observer, to his monthly Geisha Palace
event at the Notting Hill Arts Club, the Doctor’s wisdom has reached
far and wide. Here he shares his thoughts on life in London.
Are you a native Londoner?
Yes I was born in Hampstead
What do you miss most about London when you’re
away?
The people, the architecture, the silver light in the day, orange light
at night, the trees, the noise, the system, the 24 hour supermarkets,
the Chinese takeaways - pretty much everything about it because I love
it like I love a woman.
What is your first or most vivid London memory?
I was 8 - I'd been cooped up in boarding school in the Chiltern hills
for nearly a year and we went on one of those school outings to Temple
Inn - and it was seeing the embankment again and all those grand buildings
- the Savoy, the shell - it almost made me cry for joy.
Do you have a favourite London building or landmark?
I have loads but I guess I'd have to say it was looking across the Thames
from the South Bank at that stretch from Parliament to St Pauls - or is
that too widescreen?
Can you tell us a London secret?
In Tooley Street just by London Bridge, there used to be a roman temple
to the goddess Isis - and the original name of the Thames was Thamisis
- meaning the flowing Isis (it's still called the Isis in Oxford). London
was always considered a goddess ruled city.
Please describe your perfect London date.
There's no such thing as perfection and I have many versions of the
imperfect yet magnificent London date - I could give you the clichéd
version such as drinking at the fanciest member's club, followed by dinner
somewhere really swanky like say, Cyprianos followed by dancing at whichever
groovy club happens along that night but the picture that actually springs
to mind is eating wind dried duck at Poons in Lisle Street with someone
really in tune with me, then walking along in the mild winter night for
hours and hours talking and laughing and looking - along the river, all
round the streets and ending up in a beautiful penthouse flat overlooking
the entire city making love - does that
sound sound?
If you were Mayor of London, what would you change?
I'd remove the speed bumps and replace them with sensors put air
conditioning in tubes and introduce a barefoot doctor meditational soundtrack
all over the city inducing people to breathe, relax and be kind to each
other and themselves.
Do you have any thoughts for our readers on how to
survive a particularly fraught London rush hour?
Reframe the experience - see yourself as a holy man or woman on a
mission to bless as many people as possible with love and good energy
- especially the real arseholes because they need it more - then as you
squeeze yourself into the affray, visualise everyone you encounter smothered
in healing light - you'll feel like a million euros by the time to arrive
at your destination and will probably have picked up a fair few smiles
along the way.
If you fancy sampling some Barefoot Taoism for yourself,
The Doctor has invited you to join him on his Tai Chi Spring retreat in
the stunning La Selva region in Spain, running from 17 to 21 April 2005.
For full details visit http://barefootdoctorworld.me.uk/tai-chi/1/
or email nakednurse@barefootdoctorworld.com.
response home
top of page
|
