Polo and WASPs..
10
October 2002
If I don't get out of Manhattan once a month to the country or beach I'll go nuts. New York is a great city but I can appreciate it more when I have a break from it once and a while…that's just me. I'm considering buying an alarm clock that has the sound of waves crashing and seeing if I can rig it up to stay on all night. For the most part I sleep through the taxis honking their horns, the McDonalds' truck unloading right outside our window each morning at 5am and the general traffic noise, but it is a rare luxury to have no noise at all to go to sleep too…bliss.
So off we went to Millbrook (horse and vineyard country) on the Friday then to Connecticut for a Polo match between Yale and Virginia on the Saturday. I couldn't wait to get out of the city to blob out and was very curious about the Polo. Our Polo tickets included food and drink and I imagined a very flash affair indeed. Waitresses passing around hor'deurves that were impossible to eat without losing the filling down ones front, (my specialty is wearing my food you see) and quantities of champagne in dainty glasses that when you drink out of them make you crook your little finger and look like a tosser. But most importantly…what should I wear!? Having never been to a Polo match I wasn't sure if this was a jeans and t-shirt affair or hat and frock. Was it like a day at Field Days or the Boxing Day races?
The weather on Saturday couldn't have been better, sunny, no clouds and no wind. Luckily we found out prior to going to the match that jeans will do nicely and leave the hat at home for the Boxing Day races. I was hoping very quietly that it would be cold, as my roommate had just given me this fabulous black furry hat that would have been great fun to wear. Apparently I shouldn't be too keen for it to get cold in New York as once it gets cold it isn't all that pleasant.
The Polo was fantastic! The field was roped off and I stood as close as I could without actually becoming part of the match. It was a huge turnout but I must have been one of the few people (bar the owners) watching the Polo…everyone else was too busy socialising. It was definitely an occasion to drink, be merry and meet and greet. I however, couldn't drag my eyes away from the game. It was so exciting. Largely due to the speed and skill required to avoid injuring another player or horse. Gutsy game. I was impressed! Not having had the best of luck on horses myself I was amazed at how the players controlled them with one hand and played with something that resembled a hockey stick with the other…successfully! I think Yale won (from memory)…I cheered for everyone who stayed on.
Once the match was over I could turn my attention to what appeared to be the main event of the day…socialising! Funny. I met a woman whose business card claimed her to be a Baroness and she writes the sex column for Cosmo…hang on, was I on the set of Sex In The City by mistake? It definitely felt like it. Schmoosing was the real sport going on here!
WASP's (White Anglo-Saxon Protestants) and wasps were everywhere. The wasps were attracted to the sugar in the alcohol and the WASP's were just attracted too the alcohol! And there was a good representation of drunken members from both parties believe me! The hor'deurves were not in the best shape by the time we got there, in fact the cheese was positively sweating in the sun…grim. Lucky not too many people were interested in eating I guess! It was one of those afternoons where the common question was, 'what do you do'. You can imagine! Interestingly enough I met a lot of people who knew about the America's Cup, and one guy who works for Oracle. There is a lot of envy of how well such a small country like New Zealand can do in such a big money sport. Naturally we agreed to disagree about the outcome of the America's cup!
I wanted to find the fun people so off I trotted (excuse the pun) to find the Baroness. That sounds like such a laugh, writing the sex column for Cosmo…surely she makes stuff up!
I'll see if I can
find out...see you next week…
(You can also read about what I am up to on www.nzoom.co.nz under entertainment - rant.)
Regards,
romiley
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