Other Centres - Salisbury nostalgia
Salisbury
Time, ladies and gentlemen ... please: ...
what a pity - they are all gone
The once much-loved George Hotel in Avondale
closed on January 4 - sold to Multi-Choice as their new HQ. A planned
valedictory meal in the grotesquely named Freckle and Phart pub, or the
depressing dining room, which was reminiscent of railway architecture
circa 1946, was aborted, as it was semi-gutted well before closure.
Next door was Nick's Place where you went to
sober up after a night out and Mrs Nick had the biggest legs th
is side of the Sahara!
Further up George Road, some Greeks opened a
nice restaurant, the Acropolis, and were doing so well that they decided
to beat sanctions and hid their profits in the back of some copper
firescreens, only to get caught. The business was then run by the
flamboyant Spiros Blismas, who had recently enjoyed free bed and
breakfast at Chikurubi, following his venture into importing second-hand
cars from the Forces in Germany. Later Terry Rossiters son ran the
place!
Charleston Hotel (ex-Kamfinsa Park) is also
shut: "Due to ever rising," I heard. Both the above places underwent
major changes in clientele, facilities, and ambience, even cleanliness
but are fondly remembered for special functions and The George,
especially for wedding receptions, when the Cambitzis ran it.
Since independence Harare lost the popular
Windsor Hotel on Baker (Nelson Mandela) Avenue. It housed the Colony,
where Edwin and Rachelle played twin pianos to international cabaret
standards to discerning diners in formal finery. The Lincoln Room had
fantastic value for money food in luxurious surroundings. It closed late
November 1980 when the set three-course lunch, featuring baron of beef,
rolled to the table and carved to order was $1,50.
1890 was the cocktail bar. Popular with
lunchtime philanderers, it shut at 2:30 sharp, when drinkers moved next
door to Branch Office (ex-Blue Room) opening 10:30 to 10:30. Some heroic
boozers returned to 1890, which shut at 11:30.
The Egg and I was in the same building, as was
Lion's Den: almost impossible to enter unless you were in the RLI.
The day the Windsor closed (earlier than
announced to avoid vandalism seen at Meikles' Long Bar by "souvenir
hunters") beer was 38c; bar lunch 35c. Opposite was a complex housing
the raucous Round Bar and Le Coq d'Or where little French was heard. The
building was owned by an American religious sect, which left the country
at UDI. The premises were banned from selling drink or tobacco; dancing
was proscribed. For years they thought it was a library! Picture the
indignation when they found the country's most bawdy, boozy,
bare-knuckled, bra-less nightlife had flourished there for years!
Playboy was nearby, as was La Boheme: nothing
to do with opera, it offered strippers of often-venerable years and was
a target of an inexpertly thrown grenade during the "bush war". The
entrance fee for Sunset Strip was two shillings and sixpence." The
Gentlemen" were the popular Rock band that played at Saturday Lunchtimes
and Sunday Evenings!
Three major Chinese outlets closed after 1980:
Golden Dragon, a hangout of pre-independence Ministry of Information
people, the bar a favourite with international journalists; The Bamboo
Inn with a dark, dingy but somehow appealing pub run by the Kee family
and later by an Irishman called (of course) Paddy and The Mandarin, next
to Meikles Store which had no bar, but hacks and hackettes gathered
round a service hatch as if in a Fleet Street club.
Down the way the Pink Panther also had a
grenade lobbed in during the hondo. Run by two aged sisters from the
Caucasus, they served delicious kebabs at the original site, later
Linquenda House. One also owned the Georgian Grill. PP later became
Alfredo's then Front Page: restaurants with lively pubs, gregarious
regulars, and liberal hours. The "Page" owners: a blonde and a brunette
belonged in international glamour magazines.
Pino's in Union Avenue (Kwame Nkrumah) was
arguably the best seafood joint around, but gained notoriety when
someone complained and the ebullient eponymous Portuguese proprietor
whacked him over the pip with a flambe pan.
The Bombay duck between Jameson (Samora
Machel) and Central was run, improbably, by ex-BSAP Troopie, Tug Wilson;
it served iridescent curries all hours for next to nothing.
In Greendale Avenue was the Rhodies idea of an
English Pub, The Red Fox!
At Msasa, The Red Lantern, run by S-W African
(Namibian) Germans specialised in eisbein, knackwurst and bratwurst that
I can still smell and taste.
Beverly Rocks was a hospitable hostel: good
food, great music, lovely gardens, (now a government training centre.)
Going east, the old Jamaica Inn was run by
various characters including cross eyed Ruby Strutt, who was married to
Jimmy Shields, the racing Driver; an ex-Federal hangman and Commonwealth
boxing gold medal winner. Good stop there on the way to or from Three
Monkeys in Marandellas (Marondera) for lunch. (Now a religious
institute.)
Glen Lorne's local was the festive Highlands
Park, run first of all by the Nicholls family and then by ex-Kenya big
game hunter Toby Royston. Great dinner dances, lovely Sunday lunches,
cream teas in the garden.
Down the road at Chisipite Shopping Centre was
The Howf of Chisholm, which was super.
The Spaniards, Marlborough (ex-Quorn) served
incredibly good food, except for the soup, which was: always watery,
insipid and costly. . You queued and often cleared the table yourself.
The food was delicious and you either brought your own wine or bought
rotgut Barolo. Guido was deaf and when you came to pay he asked what you
had and worked it out in his head. When he retired to the mother
country, a redhead Italian bombshell bought the business and never
looked back, until the Aussie Tax Squad arrived. By that time she had
opened Sandro's in Kingsway. There's not been another Harare
establishment like Sandro's. Starting as a private club, it retained
club land ambience till the end. Five stars cooking or basic bar lunch
often polished cabarets; journalists and businessmen rubbed shoulders
with cabinet ministers.
Sardinian Sandro also ran Eros: fine
Mediterranean food and friendly bar and Sandrock's, for back-packers.
Close by was Taco's with punters Chalet as a
suitcase bomb exploded at Woolworth's nearby with many fatalities?
Regulars helped survivors. (Barbours was the real target.)
On quieter Chalet days, great juicy joints
were trundled in at lunch; patrons sliced their own for 50c with
pickles, mustard, horseradish chips and rolls.
The city's best pies were served in a motor
sport-theme cocktail bar. There was a civilized snooker room (not a
crummy pool hall.) It became a motor parts store, then a Spar.
Park Lane (now GMB HQ) the Kaya Nyama
steakhouse had its own printed "Doggy bags" as the steaks were so
enormous.
The Clovagalix, on Fife Avenue, caught fire
once too often, becoming Cafe Med, Borrowdale.
Caruso's on 4th/Samora was a great Chips
d'Oliviera club-cum Portuguese pub/restaurant. As Vila Peri, it moved to
3rd/Baines where the usually grubby Pointe is now. Next-door was Fat
Mama's, previously Spago's. Now called Mama Mia's, it thrives at
Newlands.
The Cellar, Marimba Park was tops with journos
and the printing trade, serving wonderful whisky prawns, real rosti; the
upstairs bar often seemed the centre of the universe.
Kamfinsa's Bizarre Bar (later IT, previously
Buster's, The Cockpit, etc) was hugely popular with yuppies, briefly
with buppies; once a licence to print money. New owners cut corners. Now
it's a swimming pool sundries shop.
Meikles closed The Mirabelle, The Causerie,
Flagstaff and Captain's Cabin, Bagatelle and La Chandelle.
Monomotapa lost 1001 Horsemen and Bali Hai,
but gained La Francais from Avondale.
When everywhere else closed, you could get
ABFs at Al's Place near the Kopje. Probably unlicensed: whether you
ordered whisky, brandy or rum it came from one bottle; gin, cane, vodka,
white rum another.
High -Chaparral (ex-Nick's Bar), Avondale
opened all hours: a good greasy spoon where coffee and steak rolls
helped avoid the worst "mornings after", especially after Le Matelot
(ex-Lighthouse), died a death.
Aphrodite, Strathaven, was a superb Greek
restaurant.
Demi's near State Lotteries closed due to
commuter omnibuses' anarchistic parking. The original owners set up
Tavern Bacchus, near
Reps, which then became the Manchurian.
Up the street, Copacabana served wonderful
Portuguese food, having previously been a great Chinese (White Lotus?).
The Himalaya, nearby, did colossal searing noon curries at minimal cost
but was avoided after dusk.
Rosedale's/Rose Bowl/Rose & Crown in Hatfield
was a superb Sunday lunch venue with live entertainment.
One of the best seafood platters you could
ever eat was at the Kentucky, also in Hatfield. When a Muslim outfit
bought the place, proposing to shut it, locals raised a widely supported
petition in protest. The Courts ruled in favour of the petitioners but
it's closed anyway.
Jameson's Tiffany's re-opened after many
years.
On a positive note there's a flurry of
recently opened ethnic restaurants, tea and sadza, coffee shops and
lodges; but sadly, few seem to have the character or characters in which
the closed establishments were so rich, but time will tell!