My Town, Kind O'
by Paul Moth (exerpted from Flights of Fancy, North Atlantic Airways' in-flight magazine, April 1997)

If you're in St. John's this summer for Cabot 5000 or for some important gathering you'll probably end up getting fleeced or wandering around not knowing where to go and leaving town thinking, "Why all the hullaballoo about this ancient backwater?" I've always wondered what Iron Law dictates that the out-of-towner will enter the Maudlin Leprachaun Pubbe and Eaterie on Water Street and get a plate of oily bangers and dried spud along with their badly-poured glass of Old Sham for the princely sum of $19.95? What terrible logic of tourism precludes him or her from just glancing up the adjacent alley to see the gently faded letters on the seductively ripped awning that announce the genuine warmth of the Duke & Duck, where you can have a thick pub lunch, a richly-poured pint of Big Lad Cream Ale and a good argument with a few of the locals for a mere double finn? Of course, I don't drink anymore, so I wouldn't know if the above comparison has any validity whatsoever. But let me tell you about the St. John's I do know, the one I've rediscovered and made mine anew every day of every year since coming home from a burnt out City of Angels in 1989.

I start my St. John's each morning by tooling around the house and garden where I grew up on Quidi Vidi Road, in the shade of the hulking Victorian walls of St. Joseph's Hospital where I was born, St. Matthew's Collegiate where I scraped through school, and Her Majesty's penitentiary where I spent the odd Sunday afternoon visiting relatives. Sometimes I stroll into work, grabbing a quick buff and a combover at Dick's, my neighbourhood barber, catching up on gossip, and placing the odd bet on a tip from young Dick. If I have time, I pick up The Daily Telegraph from Marty at Noseworthy's Newstand, trade rapier-like quips about the headlines, and then read my way through the miserable rag over a steaming hot shot of 23,000 p.s.i. espresso at my buddy Giovanni's Cafe Cartagena.

I don't drive, so if it's raining or I'm running a bit late, I indulge myself by calling a Shea's taxi. Since returning to town I have used no other service, and stand by the efficiency and prickly erudition of their stable of hacks. One sultry Friday night a couple of years ago, circumstance put me behind the wheel of a Shea's cab while on assignment, and I saw a side of St. John's I can't write about in a family magazine like this -- the backside!

I work in the historic Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland building on Duckworth Street. Most townees feel the place is an eyesore, and its demolition is still pending. But it's worth a visit if you're into architectural curiosities, since the building was originally the municipal abattoir, and its conversion for radio broadcasting has hidden little of its original function. I know, I know, you architecture buffs just want me to tell you where to find Duff Wheeler's masterpieces. Well, if you're rich enough to be staying at the Hotel Palmer Hotel, look no further than around you, because you're in a Duff Wheeler masterpiece. But the Wheeler that's closest to my heart, the one only deep Duff buffs know about, is the delicate steel beam and tracery of the BCN's own transmission array up on Mount Scio, the acclaimed local architect's 1935 homage to Art Indu (the forgotten counterpart to Art Deco).

Shopping tips? Well, I'm a big man, and getting decent clothes to fit is always a problem, but lately I've had a bit of success at Hercules Man Size, part of the swank deluxe row of shops that's sprouted up alongside the Hotel Palmer Hotel in the wake of the oil and nickel frenzy. If you're a big man or shopping for one, I highly recommend setting aside some time for an appointment with owner Spiro Necropolis, and enjoying the unique feeling of his long, velvet tape measure gliding up your in-seam in the most professional manner.

For night life, I confess I don't get out much, but working on the island's premier vehicle of cultural reportage keeps me in touch with the high art world, as well as the cutting edge underground. Of course, if you've got the dough to shell out, you'll be heading straight for the hit musical, Death On Ice. Afterwards you'll be moving on to a thrillingly expensive apres theatre dinner and drinks at the ultra-groovy Cafe des Poseurs, or perhaps a more romantic three-star indulgence in haute cuisine at Chez Ed. Finally (if you've got the clout to get on the guest list), you'll end up the night grinding pelvic and other bones with the celebs and the demi-monde at the Stinkhammer.

My more pedestrian night on the town starts at the Malabar Gate -- it's all good, but don't miss the irresistibly ferocious vindaloo -- then maybe an alternative and wanting theatrical production at the wonderful old worm-eaten Star of Palestine Hall (known to locals as the Old Pal). After the show, yours truly will direct himself dutifully toward home, but not before lingering on the sloping street to watch the young crowd head back downwards, to the old town, for a night of revelry and fornication which, I am told, takes place in any number of drinking establishments, including the Duke & Duck, but mostly in whatever the booze can beside the Gallery Boron is called this month.

I truly do love my St. John's, and I encourage you to trespass to taste. If the town suggested above helps you to evade that Iron Law of Tourism for even a second, I know you'll catch a glimpse of something special. And if you're in town over a Saturday, well, I wouldn't be doing my job if I forgot to invite you to tune in to 520 on the long wave for the longest-running radio show in the world, The Great Eastern: Newfoundland's Cultural Magazine. I guarantee you'll catch something special there, too.

Paul Moth's Great Eastern Map of St. John's
(note: this was the map I never did--gp)
Moth Manor -- on Quidi Vidi Road, down by St. Joseph's

St. Matthew's Elementary -- five doors down

Hotel Palmer Hotel -- somewhere around the west end of the harbour, with a big crescent drive before front entrance; beside the hotel, a strip of very swanky shops, including:

Hercules Man Size -- beside Hotel Palmer Hotel

BCN Building -- 342 Duckworth Street

BCN Transmitter Tower -- Mount Scio

BCN Radio Labs -- a warehouse off a different part of Mt. Scio

Cafe des Poseurs -- East End of Duckworth St.

The Stinkhammer -- same alley as the Alley Pub

UNSJ -- Fort Pepperell

offset campus map includes: Voigtkampf Parking Tower, Chocolate Accelerator (in Physics Bldg), Lancers Stadium, Labatt's Student Union Complex (housing The Drain, UNSJ Radio, and the Unsja student newspaper), massive amounts of very organized parking, toll gates, Department of Business English, Dpt of Marketting Philosophy, School of Medical Insurance, Centre for Post-Deluvian Research, UNSJ Press.

--MUN

Osbourne Industrial Park and Leeching Ponds, housing:

Candow Cheese and Drilling

Moth Moving and Shipping

Drodge Family Motors Factory and Test Course (on outskirts)

VOZG -- All-Zagner TV and Radio

The Five Hole - Georgetown

The Duke and Duck - anywhere downtown

Javellin Crescent -- behind Confed Bldg. and around Kent's Pond, with home of Kathleen Hanrahan, Ewan Quinlan, and J. Richard Candow

Site of Marconi's first trans-atlantic radio signal

Bookness -- Churchill Square

The Fleming Household - Malta Street

The Brace & Splinter Reliquary - South Side Rd., right next to:

Incunabulum Rare Books - South Side Rd., next to:

Kuva Pianos - South Side Rd.

Kuva Keyboards - Prescott and Water

The Old Pal - empty lot behind Kickham Place

Gerry's house (Paul's Skin Cabin Pond friend) - Whiteaway Street

St. Finnian's Teaching Hospital - Lemarchant Rd, between Grace and St. Clare's

Furlong's Confections - Blackmarsh Road

Sailors Tobacco - Job Street

Drodge Family Motors Showroom - Kenmount Road

Big Lad Breweries - around Rawlin's Cross

Brotherhood of Radio Coal Stokers and Tube Engineers Hall (on Water, by War Memorial)

Laracy Meats - Cook Street

Gallery Boron - Duckworth Street, cross from Malabar Gate

Cafe Cartagena - Near Hava Java

Malabar Gate - Duckworth (where India Gate is)

Shea's Taxi - right beside Gulliver's

Chez Ed - Tulk's Cove (a fake street between Water and Harbour Dr.)

Dick's Barber Shop - Factory Lane

Noseworthy's News - Water Street, around Byron's