Hugh Reilly - Stifling rules in the Blackboard Hole of Calcutta

ON AN outing to Crow Wood Golf Club in the sweltering summer of 1976, my attempted entry to the lounge bar was blocked by a burly steward. "You need a jacket and tie to drink in this part of the establishment," he said sternly. I informed him that, while I had a jacket in my locker, I did not have a tie.

Luckily, he was most helpful, producing from behind the bar, a kaleidoscopic tie that a circus clown would have considered too garish for a matinee performance.

The bar was heaving with full-grown men in various stages of dehydration – glo...