Sheila

I enjoyed my food and the excellent company! I will be coming on the 12th Dec. Sheila

I'm up for a Christmas Curry Club too! The 12th is good for me. Sheila

I'll be coming along too. Sheila

I'll be coming on the 3rd too. Enjoyed the food at Ganapatri - very different as you say but tasty. Would have liked an Indian beer on the drinks menu. Sheila

If there is still room I'd like to come. Sheila

I'm coming too. Sheila

Unable to come tonight. Have a great meal! Sheila

Very sorry not to be able to make Thursday. Have a great evening! Sheila

I'm coming too. Sheila

I'm coming as well.

Very good evening! Lovely food and excellent company. Thanks to Mike and the DT. Sheila

Hello, I would like to come on Thursday too. Sheila

Hi, unable to make it on Thurs as going to Cirque de Soleil that night. Have put the March date in my diary. Have a great meal. Sheila

Hi, just confirming that I am coming tomorrow. Maybe a little late at EDT or even meet you at Mirash as travelling home from Whitstable early evening. Sheila

Like new date as I can come! Sheila

Hello Enjoyed the meal and the very good company on Tuesday. Sorry cannot make Oct 24th as I have family staying. Sheila

Hello Michael I'm still up for Swadesh on Tues 25th if it's still on. Otherwise happy to go with the flow. Alan - I've been in France. Sheila

Hi Michael I can come on the 25th September - being very careful with putting things in my diary so I don't double book myself again! Not been to Swadesh so would be nice to try it out. Sheila

Unable to come tomorrow. Forgot that I have a meeting to attend. Enjoy!

Hi Michael I am coming on Thurs 26th. Food and company was excellent last month (my first attendance). Sheila

Hello Michael We met at the book club last night. I would like to come to the meal at Tandoori Nights on Wed 27th June. I think you said meet at the EDT first - what time?

Hi Book Clubbers Want to see what the Congo River, jungle and living conditions in the heart of darkness are like now? Then watch 'Cold Chain' this Sunday 29th April at 9pm on BBC2. It follows Ewan McGregor's journey to deliver vaccines to children in the Congolese jungle. Ewan is a UNICEF ambassador and his new series shows how difficult it is too keep vaccines cold (or they rapidly become unusable) and get them to children in the remotest parts of the world. I thought last Sunday's programme (in northern India and Nepal) was excellent. Sheila

Hello Book Clubbers We had a lively discussion last night covering 'The Suspicions of Mr Whicher' by Kate Summerscale (postponed from last month) and 'The Poisonwood Bible' by Barbara Kingsolver. The next meeting is at 7.30pm on Wednesday 9th May at The Clock House pub and we will be discussing 'The Heart of Darkness' by Joseph Conrad which continues the Congo theme. A synopsis: Heart of Darkness is a novella written by Joseph Conrad. Before its 1903 publication, it appeared as a three-part series (1899) in Blackwood's Magazine. It was classified by the Modern Library website editors as one of the "100 best novels" and part of the Western canon. The story centres on Charles Marlow, who narrates most of the book. He is an Englishman who takes a foreign assignment from a Belgian trading company as a river-boat captain in Africa. Heart of Darkness exposes the dark side of European colonization while exploring the three levels of darkness that the protagonist, Marlow, encounters: the darkness of the Congo wilderness, the darkness of the Europeans' cruel treatment of the African natives, and the unfathomable darkness within every human being for committing heinous acts of evil. Although Conrad does not give the name of the river, at the time of writing the Congo Free State, the location of the large and important Congo River, was a private colony of Belgium's King Leopold II. In the story, Marlow is employed to transport ivory downriver. However, his more pressing assignment is to return Kurtz, another ivory trader, to civilization, in a cover-up. Kurtz has a reputation throughout the region. This symbolic story is a story within a story or frame narrative. It follows Marlow as he recounts his Congolese adventure to a group of men aboard a ship anchored in the Thames Estuary from dusk through to late night. The passage of time and the darkening sky during Marlow's narrative parallels the atmosphere of the events he narrates. The screenplay of the 1979 epic war film 'Apocalypse Now' by John Milius and Francis Ford Coppola came from Milius's idea of adapting Joseph Conrad's novella 'Heart of Darkness' and setting it the Vietnam War. Hope to see you on 9th May. Sheila