Bend it like Beckham

There’s no rhyme or reason for why some people are rabid fans of some celebrities. Barney Chen goes into a state of shock not dissimilar to a diabetic attack at the mere mention of Madonna. To this day, he’s convinced that ‘Swept Away’ is a masterpiece that’s way up there with ‘Citizen Kane’.

            Others like Sharyn think the sun rises and sets over Fann Wong. Which I suppose, technically, it does but then, as Saffy once so trenchantly observed, the same could be said for the dung beetle. For her part, Saffy says she would hack off a leg if it meant that she could spend a night having wild sex with Jude Law.

            “How do you know it will be wild?” Amanda once asked.

            Saffy’s bosom inflated. “Are you crazy? Of course, it will be wild! Why will it not be wild? Look at this!” she insisted, as she went onto Google Images on her laptop and typed in ‘Jude Law Nude’. A series of grainy images filled the screen.

“Look at that body!” Saffy commanded. “How could sex with this man be anything but wild?”

And then there’s the tricky subject of Victoria Beckham. Talk about a woman who divides opinion. Amanda loathes her, but largely on account of the fact that she thinks David Beckham made the biggest mistake of his life marrying Victoria. “It should’ve been me!” she said once, sounding, for all the world, like a Broadway musical.

Saffy, on the other hand, thinks Victoria Beckham should be sainted while she’s still alive. “She gives so much hope to the rest of us. She married a god. She’s popped out twenty children and still has the body of an 18 year old virgin. She’s got amazing clothes, amazing shoes. She hangs out with Elton John. Seriously, she should run for prime minister!”

I bring all this up because I’m in London right now and yesterday, I was having a breakfast meeting at Delauney, a fancy new restaurant in Covent Garden, when there was a noticeable drop in the level of the volume of conversation. Like a herd of gazelles at the watering hole, we lifted our collective heads from our eggs Benedict and turned towards the entrance.

Like a tiger at night, a tall woman sheathed in the chicest black strode majestically down the aisle. As I later reported to Saffy, Victoria Beckham was immaculate. Everything about her was flawless - from the sheen on the hair, not a strand out of place, to the figure hugging dress and high heels, right down to the little black Chanel handbag. She looked like she’d just stepped off a runway.

“She must have been up since 3am to get ready to look like that!” I said.

“That’s what you can achieve when you have bazillions in your bank account,” Saffy said with approval.

Meanwhile, scurrying up behind Victoria was her personal assistant, a dowdy woman wearing her harassment like a radiation counter and overloaded with various bags and heavy coats. And behind her was the nanny carrying what everyone assumed was the latest Beckham baby.

“Oh, God, I’m so jealous you got to see her!” Saffy moaned over Skype.

            Amanda poked her head into the screen. “Who cares about her? Did you see David? Was he there?” 

            “No, just her and her assistants. She was having a meeting with a guy in spectacles. With her baby on her lap.”

            Saffy says that this is the way women should juggle their careers. With a personal assistant and a nanny. “I'd love to be able to march into a restaurant and be trailed by people carrying all my crap! And when the kid starts acting up, I hand him back to his nanny so that I can continue to crunch numbers and seal the deal!”

            Barney Chen wanted to know if I’d taken pictures. “Oh my God, please tell me you took pictures! I ADORE Victoria Beckham!” he texted.

            I wrote back: “If the world came to an end and there was space only for one more person on the space shuttle, who would it be – Victoria or Madonna?”

            Almost immediately, his reply pinged back. “OMG, it’s like Sophie’s Choice! I can’t choose! I think I wld sacrifice myself n save both of them!!!!!”

            Apparently, Saffy told Barney he was so dumb. “You’d never have to make the choice because you’d have kicked Jason off the space shuttle first!”

            Amanda reported that Barney replied, “Oooh, that is so true!”

            If I ever inherit Victoria Beckham’s millions, I know who will be following behind me and carrying my crap when I walk into a restaurant for my meeting with Jude Law.