What happened when I met Vladimir Putin...

Putin on the Ritz


The great thing about supping in gay bars is that you never know who you are going to meet and last week, I had the abundant joy and immense privilege to bump into my old mucker, Vladimir Putin in one of my favourite watering holes. We first met in Moscow in 1985 when Vlad (The Impaler, to his most intimate chums) was still attached to the KGB and had tried to recruit me as a mole. Unused to burrowing in dark and dank places, I had to decline. Besides, I had hopes of becoming The BolshoiтАЩs prima ballerina- I was very light on my toes in those days. They turned me down. But IтАЩm not bitter. As an aside, did you know that тАШBolshoiтАЩ means тАШbigтАЩ? As I said, IтАЩm not bitter.

So what was Vlad doing in a Thai gay bar, slinging back the Vodkas at a rate that would shame Comrade Yeltsin? It is always wise to remember that he was a black belt in the Soviet martial art of Sambo before he switched to the Japanese island discipline of Judo, so direct questions are best avoided. I knew that after a few тАШNa ZdrovieтАЩsтАЩ, heтАЩd soon loosen up. тАЬWhatтАЩs your poison?тАЭ he enquired. тАЬNot polonium 210,тАЭ I replied, causing him to roar with laughter. How sad that his legendary sense of humour is so underreported.

The bar staff had rarely been so rigorously tested and with several bottles of Stolichnaya emptied, Vlad got serious. Clapping an avuncular arm around my slender shoulder, his face loomed close to mine, his warm blue eyes searched my bloodshot peepers: тАЬYou know I love you James,тАЭ he said with barely a slur. тАЬI need your help.тАЭ I cannot remember my flabber being more gasted. тАЬOf course,тАЭ I said, тАЬname it.тАЭ I knew that he had recently split with wife of 30 years, Lyudmila, and guessed that he wanted me to recommend some alternative company, so was ready to slip him a copy of OUT iTтАЩs guide to the local massage emporiums.

Maybe he wanted me to have a word in ObamaтАЩs shell-like following the recent diplomatic snub but it turns out that all the contemporary publicity about darling Vlad is a plot to discredit him, he says, hatched by his previous partner in tandemocracy, Dmitry Medvedev. тАЬHeтАЩs trying to make me look like Margaret Thatcher,тАЭ wailed my old friend, adding that he welcomed gay pride, gay education for youngsters and hoped that the gay Russian competitors in the Sochi Winter Olympics would party like, тАЬItтАЩs 1917.тАЭ He was piteously wretched, especially as I could not erase the image of him in a blond wig, blue two-piece with padded shoulders and wielding a handbag, from my inebriated mind. He needed some good publicity. He knew that OUT iT is read by the VVIPтАЩs of the world. He wanted the record putтАж straight. That is how I could help him. тАЬConsider it done,тАЭ I said to his patent relief. And now it has been.