People who don't like Mondays (eg Bob Geldof) should fly on the Sunday run of BA15. LHR-SYD. London to Sydney. A 2-leg 1-number flight taking me over 10,000 miles away from London. It leaves London on Sunday and arrives in Sydney on Tuesday, so Monday doesn't exist. Bit mental that.
I was sat in 13G, which IIRC was the first time all year I'd not managed to grab a window seat. That was my fault, because originally I was booked to fly the following day, but ho hum. I had bagged 13G, a forward facing aisle seat, right hand side of the middle 4 seats at the front of the cabin, just before first class. The benefit of this seat over any of the others is that no fucker has to clamber over me, nor do I have to clamber over any fucker, to get in and out. Was a bit confused to begin with though as I didn't twig that my entertainment guide etc were in a pocket on the back of the seat next to me (ie, not visible from my seat).
Seatexpert.com (or seatguru.com, or both, I forget and can't be bothered looking) said that 13G is great for singles. It also says that seats 13E and 13F are shit for singles, but great for couples. What they don't say is that 13G is great for singles unless 13E and F are occupied by a couple who intend to engage in horseplay for hours on end. No Mile High Club stuff going on, mind, just a lot of tickling and noise making and talking too loud and occasional bumping of the divider between F and G that more than once made me think my beer was going to go flying. Sigh. They were being treated nicely by the attendants too, as I think they'd been downgraded from first class. Fuckers.
Anyway. The first leg of the flight is the big 'un, 12 hours or so direct to Singapore. Such flights are a lot more fun if the entertainment system works, rather than having sound so bad -- loud static noises every 2 seconds or so -- that they decide to turn the entire thing off for the whole plane after 2 hours of unlistenable nonsense. Bit shit that. I tried to get some kip and got some, but nothing special and nothing of particularly high quality either. At least the map channel worked; what kind of crazy ass place name is Szczecin?
In terms of scran and booze, the menu was the same as the flights to/from Dubai. Having recently learnt that (a) London Pride is available in cans, and (b) they serve it on BA flights, I asked for that explicitly and got one. Then I asked for another, and got one. Then when they saw that was empty, they asked if I wanted another and said they'd go get one from the first class trolley 'cos no-one up there seemed to drink it. Heh.
They didn't give me an amenity pack. :-(
Seat 13G's reading light shines directly over whoever is sat in 12J, so when I wanted to read I was in danger of keeping someone else awake, or worse still, waking them up. So there was no entertainment and I couldn't read much, which meant watching the map channel a LOT. There are lots of places that end in -bad. Islamabad, Faisalabad, loads and loads more. I should have written a few of them down to make this point a little better, huh?
Placenames confuse me, actually. The names are shown, in both English and the language of where you're going to (or coming from, if that's non-English), on the map. But what gives there? A name is a name, and at least in my mind that don't have any real meanings, at least not contemporary ones. OK, I guess some do: England is Land of the Angles, which I can understand is something you can translate (eg Angleterre). But what about, say, "Spain"? Why is that word different in different languages? It's a name: surely the Spanish should have sovereignty over what it's called, everywhere, even down to the script it's written in? And talking of script, how comes the Chinese and Koreans and Japanese can write place names? AIUI they don't have alphabets per se, their writing isn't meant to denote pronunciation but instead have symbols which are words, full of meaning. So how do they decide on the series of glyphs that together means "Austria"? My mind boggles. I need to look this stuff up.
*cough* Sorry about that. Back to the flight. Coming into Sydney we had an aborted landing, which was fun, never had one of those before. There was something on the runway, spotted a bit late, a dead bird or summat. ATC told the pilot to abort so from pretty low down we went into a steep climb, heh. Ended up landing on a different runway which meant we took longer than we should have done to get to the gate. That meant my 2.5 hours at the airport turned into about 90 minutes in the end, ho hum. Still managed to get myself into the Qantas/BA lounge for a lager though, then back to the aircraft. The good news was they'd managed to fix the entertainment system... sort of. Something was wrong with audio channel one, but they'd fixed two, and told us to use that. Unfortunately audio channel two was English on every channel except the film I wanted to watch, on which it was fucking Spanish. So I watched a different film, one called Confidence -- which was actually really good.
Fish medley followed by chicken breast for food this time, I couldn't finish it and didn't even attempt dessert. Still fitted in another London Pride though, innit. Grabbed a couple of hours kip, I estimate I had 5 hours tops throughout the entire journey. Breakfast and some immigration cards greeted the early morning as we headed towards the 0515 landing in Sydney. Turns out the Australians want to know the address where you're staying, which is fair enough (the yanks and various others, in fact maybe everyone, want to know that stuff too). Just a shame that I didn't have the faintest idea about where my bro's wife's sister's house is. Even better, my phone refused to roam on any Aussie network in the airport so I couldn't get hold of him to find out. I asked an immigration staffer what to do before reaching the counter and to my relief he said a phone number would be OK, so I wrote that and got through.
By Christ they're a bit serious about what they let into that thar country. As well as immigration and baggage you have to go through quarantine, FFHS. And talking of baggage, it took me ages to get mine because I'd forgotten what my bag looked like. I only bought it the day before and was actually looking for the one I used last week in Dubai. D'oh!
With all that going on I thought my brother would be right annoyed, what with him probably having got to the airport at 0500 or so. I needn't have worried, since he didn't even wake up until 0505 -- ten minutes before my flight was due to land -- so he'd not been there long really. He drove me to the digs: it was 0630 on Tuesday morning. I was knackered. So we went out... which will be detailed in a separate post.
Friday, September 22, 2006
Lioness
Even though I'm not uploading anything to flickr yet, I just can't resist spoiling everything by uploading what is possibly my favourite of all the photos I've ever taken. This lioness lives in Sydney zoo.
Oh my god I can't believe it, I've never been this far away from home
The Kaiser Chiefs succinctly explained my predicament in that chorus, and it's true. As I type I look at my watch, seeing that it says 6.20pm on Friday evening. As I look at the screen, I see my still-in-UK-time laptop telling me it's 7.20am on Friday morning. The good news is: it's nearer pub time for me than it is for everyone back home. Bit odd being so far in the future though, innit.
Talking of UK time -vs- where I am, here's a tip I really need to learn sharpish: if I want to get up at 7.45am, I should either (a) set my phone to local time, or (b) set the alarm to UK time plus offset. But not set my UK-time phone to go off at 7.45am UK time. Like I did this morning. Good job I'd been awake almost constantly from 3am(!); even better job that going another 2 hours further into the future means being knackered is fine, 'cos I've got a short waking day.
Anyway, so, I'm sat in the Mercure Hotel Windsor, Auckland. I'm on the top (8th) floor (lift only goes up to 7, bah), with a view of the bigger and better proper Mercure Hotel directly out of my room. Either side of it I can see car parks, business buildings, and also the sea. I wasn't after a view and am not that fussed about it not being particularly great. I am, however, impressed by having breakfast thrown in with my room rate, and a kitchenette. This room is almost suite-esque, having a door between the living roomy bit and the bedroom. Bit of a shame that there's no TV in the bedroom, but I'll live. The Kiwi accents on Sky News NZ behind me are already winding me up.
I realised on the cab ride from the airport that I didn't take enough advantage of the lounge in Sydney. That was the only international flight I'm taking from that airport (and therefore the only flight from that terminal), and despite fatcatting it up I'm not allowed into the lounge when flying domestic. So instead of just grab a slice of carrot cake and a small glass of diet coke I really should have done more. Not to worry, just gives me an excuse to come back in business class at some other point (hey, Yahoo!, send me to Australia, I'm finally up for it ... )
I really could have done a bit more too, since the flight boarded late. I was just about to leave when the lady on reception mentioned it over the tannoy, saying people should sit tight in the lounge. I was fidgetty and all packed up by then though, so 10 minutes later, before boarding was announced, I made my way to the gate. It was rammed and still not boarding, but as soon as I sat down they announced that those with children under 5, those requiring assistance, and those flying business class could board. So on I got, straight into the seat 1A, window on the left of the front row Sir.
Business class was empty. Maybe 8 people in total. Not a single other person in row 1 so I could have taken my pick, but it also leads me to believe it's not prime real estate for those in the know. But I don't really care -- I chose the seat because of the number, not because it might be the best place to sit, and as it happens I thought it was fine. I had windows, more legroom than I could shake my legs at, and total privacy. Staring at a wall isn't interesting, so I didn't: I watched Thank You For Smoking, which was pretty good.
Presumably at least in part because of how empty the cabin was, I thought service was superb. Being referred to as Mr Foreman is always a winner, the food was spot on (trout with potatoes and tomatoes, fruit salad, two ciabattas, a selection of cheese with biscuits and some strange dried fruit I couldn't identify except for the date). Before we'd taken off I'd had a glass of champagne with a refill, and when I asked for a beer the attendant presented me with one can of each on a tray asking me to take my pick. I chose the only one I'd never had before: Hahn's.
Hahn's is alcohol free.
It was only a short flight, 2h30m or so. We'd taken off late for various reasons, some of which weren't even known to the pilot who was in full-on fair dinkum Aussie mode.
Cracking views of Sydney and the coast was followed by a whole bunch of ocean and clouds before our descent, a "high speed descent" requested by the flight crew. New Zealand is a bit cloudy at the moment, which is a shame, but I still got a cracking view of coastline and loads of small islands. I was watching the map display for a few minutes after the film stopped and got really confused, as it had every stat correct except for the distance left to the destination. If it was to be believed, there was 27 minutes until landing and only 3854 miles to go. Hrm.
Loads to do in Auckland. It's Friday night and I'm in livelyville (I think!) so might go out on the hunt for a beer or two, perhaps some metal or maybe the casino. Although what I really need to do is have a shave and a bit of a relax. Saturday must surely be as lively as Friday, and I might even want to get on a boat tour at 9.15am or summat daft like that. Then of course there's the small matter of having shitloads of photos to upload but a 50mb per 24hr data limit to contend with :-(
Oh, and the last 3 days to write about. D'oh!
Talking of UK time -vs- where I am, here's a tip I really need to learn sharpish: if I want to get up at 7.45am, I should either (a) set my phone to local time, or (b) set the alarm to UK time plus offset. But not set my UK-time phone to go off at 7.45am UK time. Like I did this morning. Good job I'd been awake almost constantly from 3am(!); even better job that going another 2 hours further into the future means being knackered is fine, 'cos I've got a short waking day.
Anyway, so, I'm sat in the Mercure Hotel Windsor, Auckland. I'm on the top (8th) floor (lift only goes up to 7, bah), with a view of the bigger and better proper Mercure Hotel directly out of my room. Either side of it I can see car parks, business buildings, and also the sea. I wasn't after a view and am not that fussed about it not being particularly great. I am, however, impressed by having breakfast thrown in with my room rate, and a kitchenette. This room is almost suite-esque, having a door between the living roomy bit and the bedroom. Bit of a shame that there's no TV in the bedroom, but I'll live. The Kiwi accents on Sky News NZ behind me are already winding me up.
I realised on the cab ride from the airport that I didn't take enough advantage of the lounge in Sydney. That was the only international flight I'm taking from that airport (and therefore the only flight from that terminal), and despite fatcatting it up I'm not allowed into the lounge when flying domestic. So instead of just grab a slice of carrot cake and a small glass of diet coke I really should have done more. Not to worry, just gives me an excuse to come back in business class at some other point (hey, Yahoo!, send me to Australia, I'm finally up for it ... )
I really could have done a bit more too, since the flight boarded late. I was just about to leave when the lady on reception mentioned it over the tannoy, saying people should sit tight in the lounge. I was fidgetty and all packed up by then though, so 10 minutes later, before boarding was announced, I made my way to the gate. It was rammed and still not boarding, but as soon as I sat down they announced that those with children under 5, those requiring assistance, and those flying business class could board. So on I got, straight into the seat 1A, window on the left of the front row Sir.
Business class was empty. Maybe 8 people in total. Not a single other person in row 1 so I could have taken my pick, but it also leads me to believe it's not prime real estate for those in the know. But I don't really care -- I chose the seat because of the number, not because it might be the best place to sit, and as it happens I thought it was fine. I had windows, more legroom than I could shake my legs at, and total privacy. Staring at a wall isn't interesting, so I didn't: I watched Thank You For Smoking, which was pretty good.
Presumably at least in part because of how empty the cabin was, I thought service was superb. Being referred to as Mr Foreman is always a winner, the food was spot on (trout with potatoes and tomatoes, fruit salad, two ciabattas, a selection of cheese with biscuits and some strange dried fruit I couldn't identify except for the date). Before we'd taken off I'd had a glass of champagne with a refill, and when I asked for a beer the attendant presented me with one can of each on a tray asking me to take my pick. I chose the only one I'd never had before: Hahn's.
Hahn's is alcohol free.
It was only a short flight, 2h30m or so. We'd taken off late for various reasons, some of which weren't even known to the pilot who was in full-on fair dinkum Aussie mode.
Ah, we'll be taking off to the East, which is the wrong way, and then turning right. Mind you I've been wrong about that before, traffic control might tell me to turn back towards Sydney, so I don't really know. Just sit back and enjoy the flight.
Cracking views of Sydney and the coast was followed by a whole bunch of ocean and clouds before our descent, a "high speed descent" requested by the flight crew. New Zealand is a bit cloudy at the moment, which is a shame, but I still got a cracking view of coastline and loads of small islands. I was watching the map display for a few minutes after the film stopped and got really confused, as it had every stat correct except for the distance left to the destination. If it was to be believed, there was 27 minutes until landing and only 3854 miles to go. Hrm.
Loads to do in Auckland. It's Friday night and I'm in livelyville (I think!) so might go out on the hunt for a beer or two, perhaps some metal or maybe the casino. Although what I really need to do is have a shave and a bit of a relax. Saturday must surely be as lively as Friday, and I might even want to get on a boat tour at 9.15am or summat daft like that. Then of course there's the small matter of having shitloads of photos to upload but a 50mb per 24hr data limit to contend with :-(
Oh, and the last 3 days to write about. D'oh!
INTERNET! SWEET SWEET INTERNET!
What ace blogging exploits huh? Turns out that other than a few minutes in the lounge in Singapore airport on the way to Sydney, the first Internet access I've had (other than a bit of terrifyingly expensive 3G data roaming on my phone) is right now, in the Qantas business class lounge as I wait for my flight to Auckland. I've been staying with my brother Kevin and his wife Sally, who are currently renting a room in (Sally's sister) Mara's house. Turns out she has no home phone, no PC, no Internet connection. Frankly there was no way I was going to spend any time in Internet cafes to get online, nor could I be bothered carting my laptop around the city hunting for hotspots, so that's why silence has been maintained.
Been too busy anyway! Which means I have shitloads to write, but it's less than an hour 'til my flight starts boarding. On the plane I'm in seat 1A which may be dreadful, I dunno, it just sounds really cool. Got a whole bunch of emails to read, a few to write, and other stuff to check on rather than spend much time writing a huge entry here and now. I also have, I think, over 250 photos to upload -- which will probably take longer to do than I have here. Of course my Auckland hotel has wifi so once I'm settled in there later today I'll do a bit of writing. But if anyone is interested in a precis, here it is: Sydney is fucking fantastic.
That's all (for now).
Been too busy anyway! Which means I have shitloads to write, but it's less than an hour 'til my flight starts boarding. On the plane I'm in seat 1A which may be dreadful, I dunno, it just sounds really cool. Got a whole bunch of emails to read, a few to write, and other stuff to check on rather than spend much time writing a huge entry here and now. I also have, I think, over 250 photos to upload -- which will probably take longer to do than I have here. Of course my Auckland hotel has wifi so once I'm settled in there later today I'll do a bit of writing. But if anyone is interested in a precis, here it is: Sydney is fucking fantastic.
That's all (for now).
Sunday, September 17, 2006
DONE4 lounges now
Yes, the puns on the ticket name never end. I type as I'm sat in the Gate 1 lounge in Heathrow's terminal 4, having arrived just before 8pm despite getting out of my cab at 1845 or so. This lounge is new to me and, indeed, the fourth lounge on my trip:
Been jumpy as fuck all day today. This is like my first trip to San Francisco back in 2001, doubled. Back then that was my first ever long haul flight, the first time I'd ever been more than 1 hour outside of the UK's timezone, and the longest I'd ever spent outside of the UK in one go (2 weeks). Well, now I'm flying double the distance and going for double the amount of time -- although I did in 2002 spend a little over 3 weeks on mainland Europe. The good news is that I tend to only get jumpy, nervous, and frankly worried about what I'm doing when I've got dead time to fill and the football on TV isn't enough to keep me occupied. I panicked a lot today about the stuff I was packing -- was it enough, was it too much, was I forgetting something, why can't I just accept the objective truth that all I really need is a passport, ticket, and credit card, etc etc. But it's all over now because as of 6pm I've had a definite pattern of activity to follow with no time to consider once again the outright madness of my trip.
That pattern of activity, of course, relates to the outright madness of my trip. Upon arrival at T4 I, along with nigh-on everyone else, would tend to head straight towards the check-in desks. Not so today, for as more attentive readers would have noticed I am travelling on a ticket dated tomorrow. When I bought the flights there were no spaces on any BA or Qantas flights to Sydney today and the best they could do was fit me on tomorrow's BA15, but since last week spaces became available. The flexibility of my ticket allows for date and time changes to happen for free, and because of that I was able to queue up at the BA ticket desk today and, like a truly seasoned flyer rather than the charlatan I actually am, say
So, next stop, fast track security. In these times of heightened paranoia, "fast" is most definitely a relative term, even more so when there's only one scanner working for two queues of people. The most puzzling thing to me though is that not once has anyone measured my hand luggage. I'm beginning to think that all BA (and BAA) staff must have had amazing training enabling them to determine whether a bag fits on the bins purely on sight, since that's now 3 times in a week when my bag -- which fits the dimensions exactly, and to my mind therefore is one that should raise an eyebrow or two -- has gone unmeasured.
Once through security, I'm home and dry. After flying from this terminal last Saturday I am of course aware of where the lounge is, no wandering around like a lost fool this time! And so, opposite gate 10, I present my boarding card to be granted entrance.
So, who'd have thought I could write so much nonsense about a simple 2 hour trip from home to this lounge? Mind you the reason I spout so much is not that I'm bored: my first ever work experience assignment was as a journalist on a local rag in Sutton and I twigged the other day that the main reason I write this shit is because I just like writing; I don't mind the sound of my own voice, but I really like the sight of my own text. The fact that some people enjoy reading what I write -- and may even mean it when they say that ;-) -- is icing on the cake.
Mmm. Cake. Time to go see what free scran and booze I can retrieve before boarding my free-scran-and-booze laden 20-odd-bastard-hour flight.
PS, Phil, if you're reading this, ta muchly for the BT Openzone subscription: muchly muchly appreciated. Imagine a little thumbs up symbol in place of this sentence.
- Gibraltar's Peninsula lounge
- Terminal 4's gate 10/Lounge pavilion Terraces lounge
- Dubai's Terraces lounge
- This one
Been jumpy as fuck all day today. This is like my first trip to San Francisco back in 2001, doubled. Back then that was my first ever long haul flight, the first time I'd ever been more than 1 hour outside of the UK's timezone, and the longest I'd ever spent outside of the UK in one go (2 weeks). Well, now I'm flying double the distance and going for double the amount of time -- although I did in 2002 spend a little over 3 weeks on mainland Europe. The good news is that I tend to only get jumpy, nervous, and frankly worried about what I'm doing when I've got dead time to fill and the football on TV isn't enough to keep me occupied. I panicked a lot today about the stuff I was packing -- was it enough, was it too much, was I forgetting something, why can't I just accept the objective truth that all I really need is a passport, ticket, and credit card, etc etc. But it's all over now because as of 6pm I've had a definite pattern of activity to follow with no time to consider once again the outright madness of my trip.
That pattern of activity, of course, relates to the outright madness of my trip. Upon arrival at T4 I, along with nigh-on everyone else, would tend to head straight towards the check-in desks. Not so today, for as more attentive readers would have noticed I am travelling on a ticket dated tomorrow. When I bought the flights there were no spaces on any BA or Qantas flights to Sydney today and the best they could do was fit me on tomorrow's BA15, but since last week spaces became available. The flexibility of my ticket allows for date and time changes to happen for free, and because of that I was able to queue up at the BA ticket desk today and, like a truly seasoned flyer rather than the charlatan I actually am, say
I have a reservation on BA15 but my ticket is dated tomorrow, I'd like you to endorse this, thanks.Bish bash bosh, Greg at the desk did it straight off. When I asked for him to similarly endorse the ticket for the BA flight numbers for Sydney-Auckland-Sydney he told me it wasn't necessary, though. Not sure about that but I'll sort it out in Sydney I guess.
So, next stop, fast track security. In these times of heightened paranoia, "fast" is most definitely a relative term, even more so when there's only one scanner working for two queues of people. The most puzzling thing to me though is that not once has anyone measured my hand luggage. I'm beginning to think that all BA (and BAA) staff must have had amazing training enabling them to determine whether a bag fits on the bins purely on sight, since that's now 3 times in a week when my bag -- which fits the dimensions exactly, and to my mind therefore is one that should raise an eyebrow or two -- has gone unmeasured.
Once through security, I'm home and dry. After flying from this terminal last Saturday I am of course aware of where the lounge is, no wandering around like a lost fool this time! And so, opposite gate 10, I present my boarding card to be granted entrance.
You're welcome to use this lounge, sir, but your flight will board at gate 6 and there is a lounge directly opposite that one. This lounge also tends to get quite full.Well, that's me told -- the charlatan is unmasked and here I am in the lounge directly opposite gate 6. My entrance itself was not without incident, however: the kind lass manning reception asked me for my BA Executive Club membership number, as for some reason it was not on my boarding pass and not associated with this flight (meaning I wouldn't earn all the miles and Tier Points!). Turns out my account is in some kind of triple limbo status with no system agreeing with any other about how slim/podgy/fat a cat I really am. All fun and games, innit.
So, who'd have thought I could write so much nonsense about a simple 2 hour trip from home to this lounge? Mind you the reason I spout so much is not that I'm bored: my first ever work experience assignment was as a journalist on a local rag in Sutton and I twigged the other day that the main reason I write this shit is because I just like writing; I don't mind the sound of my own voice, but I really like the sight of my own text. The fact that some people enjoy reading what I write -- and may even mean it when they say that ;-) -- is icing on the cake.
Mmm. Cake. Time to go see what free scran and booze I can retrieve before boarding my free-scran-and-booze laden 20-odd-bastard-hour flight.
PS, Phil, if you're reading this, ta muchly for the BT Openzone subscription: muchly muchly appreciated. Imagine a little thumbs up symbol in place of this sentence.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
send off
Not a bad send off from AFC Wimbledon today. Went to see them play Horsham in the FA Cup after visiting Dad this morning (delivering some shopping, sorting out his PC and making sure he can keep in contact with me while I'm away etc). It was a great game, despite the ref trying to spoil it by being a total fucking disgrace, and we won 1-0 with a goal in injury time. Best of all was the announcement over the PA at half time that I'd won 450 quid in the monthly prize draw (the "Dons Draw"). Fucking results!
Tomorrow I go to the airport early. Dunno quite how early just yet... thinking about getting there for 6pm, which is 4 hours before the flight, because not only do I want to make the most of the lounge but I have to visit the BA desk first. Only thing is I really feel like watching the 2 big Premiership games tomorrow. Maybe a cab at 6pm will do.
The reason I need to visit the BA desk is because I'm once again making life hard for myself. I've never turned up at an airport to try and get on a flight which the ticket I have isn't for, but tomorrow I'm doing just that: booked on BA15 on Monday, as previously mentioned I got it moved to BA15 tomorrow. Well, the ticket still says Monday, obviously, and I need to get BA to understand that it's valid. That part should be easy; the other part is that in terms of playing the sad plane geek frequent flyer game I also got the travel agent to change my flights between Sydney and Auckland next weekend: I'm flying on exactly the same flights, but my booking is now on the BA marketed flight numbers rather than the Qantas flight numbers (they are Qantas flights). The reason for doing this is beacuse it triples the amount of BA tier points I earn for the flights... 240 instead of 80. Believe me, this is good news.
That's today and the future dealt with; yesterday I went to the Cocks with Wooj, Harv and Yvonne for a night of mostly me talking about my holiday, and all of us talking about metal. Got home and ordered pizza, our choice of vendor based entirely on who will deliver alcohol with the food (Topps do). The night before I'd been out with John and Hasty in Wimbledon, an as-predicted big 'un. I don't remember the exact topics we ranged over but I do remember at one point we decided that an opinion Hasty expressed was either right, or he was being a cunt: the conclusion was that he was being a right cunt.
Nerves setting in a bit. Gibraltar only kept me for a few hours, Dubai for just a few days. But now I'm about to escape Europe's gravitational pull and be out of the UK for the longest continuous period in my life so far. Eek! There's still a safety net: the first few days being spent with family, then a weekend away in Auckland, then family again; but as of next Friday I've got 3 weeks on me own in a host of foreign lands. Whoa. Mind you, it's the good type of nerves -- I'm fucking stoked! Bring on Hong Kong, Singapore, and Tokyo. Although I'm still not sure about spending any time in a capsule hotel just because lots of other people want me to... ;-) I also have instructions to visit the Namco museum, and take photos of toilets. Hmm.
Tomorrow I go to the airport early. Dunno quite how early just yet... thinking about getting there for 6pm, which is 4 hours before the flight, because not only do I want to make the most of the lounge but I have to visit the BA desk first. Only thing is I really feel like watching the 2 big Premiership games tomorrow. Maybe a cab at 6pm will do.
The reason I need to visit the BA desk is because I'm once again making life hard for myself. I've never turned up at an airport to try and get on a flight which the ticket I have isn't for, but tomorrow I'm doing just that: booked on BA15 on Monday, as previously mentioned I got it moved to BA15 tomorrow. Well, the ticket still says Monday, obviously, and I need to get BA to understand that it's valid. That part should be easy; the other part is that in terms of playing the sad plane geek frequent flyer game I also got the travel agent to change my flights between Sydney and Auckland next weekend: I'm flying on exactly the same flights, but my booking is now on the BA marketed flight numbers rather than the Qantas flight numbers (they are Qantas flights). The reason for doing this is beacuse it triples the amount of BA tier points I earn for the flights... 240 instead of 80. Believe me, this is good news.
That's today and the future dealt with; yesterday I went to the Cocks with Wooj, Harv and Yvonne for a night of mostly me talking about my holiday, and all of us talking about metal. Got home and ordered pizza, our choice of vendor based entirely on who will deliver alcohol with the food (Topps do). The night before I'd been out with John and Hasty in Wimbledon, an as-predicted big 'un. I don't remember the exact topics we ranged over but I do remember at one point we decided that an opinion Hasty expressed was either right, or he was being a cunt: the conclusion was that he was being a right cunt.
Nerves setting in a bit. Gibraltar only kept me for a few hours, Dubai for just a few days. But now I'm about to escape Europe's gravitational pull and be out of the UK for the longest continuous period in my life so far. Eek! There's still a safety net: the first few days being spent with family, then a weekend away in Auckland, then family again; but as of next Friday I've got 3 weeks on me own in a host of foreign lands. Whoa. Mind you, it's the good type of nerves -- I'm fucking stoked! Bring on Hong Kong, Singapore, and Tokyo. Although I'm still not sure about spending any time in a capsule hotel just because lots of other people want me to... ;-) I also have instructions to visit the Namco museum, and take photos of toilets. Hmm.
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Mmmm, pizza
Went out last night for a few Kew Brews with Wooj, then had pizza afterwards. PapaJohns now do online ordering, which is cool, and also let you order up to 30 days in advance, which is mental as fuck. I'm thinking of ordering myself one just before I leave the country so it's waiting for me when I get home. Also noticed this stuff on the menu: shitloads of extra toppings, it'd cost nearly 36 quid to buy a large pizza with every topping! And having chilli powder cost the same as any other topping seems a bit off.
Went round to see me Dad today. Other than being in constant pain he's alright, I guess. We went to Tesco and did a bunch of shopping, that was it really. Gonna pop round there again on Saturday or Sunday before gallavanting, I think he's gonna be OK while I'm off though.
Off out this evening for what will almost certainly be an inadvertent big 'un. Hasty always says he can't handle beer any more but whenever we meet up we don't half put it away, and with John coming along too (hopefully) ... still, not like i've got to get up tomorrow ;-)
Time for a bit of obligatory fatcatluxurytravel boasting: last week I contacted BA saying "Look, I know my membership year ends on Friday, but I'm about to fly loads with you. How about extending it for a bit so I can get a bit of higher status and benefits with you?" Turns out they were happy to oblige and extended it by 2 weeks; 6 days later I'd earnt enough "Tier Points" to make the next level, Silver, and today they confirmed that I've reached it. Heh. So now I'm on my way to making GOLD status which means all kinds of perks and shit for the next 3 years, basically (1 year of just-earned silver, 1 year of gold when I qualify mid-2007, 1 year of silver after i fail dismally to requalify): lounge access whatever class I fly is the best one though, natch ;-)
Mmm. Pre-beer curry with the Archers looms large on my horizon. Mushroom dopiaza here I come!
Went round to see me Dad today. Other than being in constant pain he's alright, I guess. We went to Tesco and did a bunch of shopping, that was it really. Gonna pop round there again on Saturday or Sunday before gallavanting, I think he's gonna be OK while I'm off though.
Off out this evening for what will almost certainly be an inadvertent big 'un. Hasty always says he can't handle beer any more but whenever we meet up we don't half put it away, and with John coming along too (hopefully) ... still, not like i've got to get up tomorrow ;-)
Time for a bit of obligatory fatcatluxurytravel boasting: last week I contacted BA saying "Look, I know my membership year ends on Friday, but I'm about to fly loads with you. How about extending it for a bit so I can get a bit of higher status and benefits with you?" Turns out they were happy to oblige and extended it by 2 weeks; 6 days later I'd earnt enough "Tier Points" to make the next level, Silver, and today they confirmed that I've reached it. Heh. So now I'm on my way to making GOLD status which means all kinds of perks and shit for the next 3 years, basically (1 year of just-earned silver, 1 year of gold when I qualify mid-2007, 1 year of silver after i fail dismally to requalify): lounge access whatever class I fly is the best one though, natch ;-)
Mmm. Pre-beer curry with the Archers looms large on my horizon. Mushroom dopiaza here I come!
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
Do Buy
Well what can I say. I'm glad I went to Dubai but I'm happier to be back. Just too bloody hot there, plus there's very little scenery to talk of, next to no history, and it was impossible to spend any time outside. September is a transition month as it starts to get cooler, but according to one of the bus tour guides it was already 10 degrees cooler than it was in August -- and it was 40-42C yesterday.
The Arabic breakfast I started the day with was alright, I suppose. More food than I could eat and I had a bit of everything it came with, but I wasn't particularly taken by the soup-type-stuff, the cheese didn't really taste like cheese, and the yoghurt was way too thick. Who knows what was what though? It included:
Checked out and failed to get any cash from reception, but the hotel next door has an ATM so I was told to go there. It was about 1030 and within a split second of leaving my glasses steamed up. Thankfully the doormen are equipped with tissues to offer guests: I assume this happens pretty regularly.
By the time I got back from the Oasis Beach Hotel with 500 dirhams I needed to change my shirt 'cos I was drenched. I have no idea how people can live and work in weather like this, especially the thousands of construction workers. How are they not all dropping dead of dehydration or skin cancer all the time? And talking of construction workers I was given some idea of scale: the single project (albeit a bloody hefty one) going on next door to the Hilton is called the Jumeirah Beach Residence, and that alone employs 20,000 of 'em.
Oh yeah, 500 dirhams. That's about 72 quid at current rates, and given that the bus tour was 150 dirhams I figured it was a sensible amount to get out. After all I wasn't leaving until a lot later and I needed cash to eat, being unable to charge anything to my room any more. What I didn't know was that the machine was going to give me a 500 dirham note. Very glad I was buying the bus ticket before anything else, but FFHS if I'd just wanted a pint or summat that wouldn't have been fun.
The bus tour came on time and -- glory be! -- half of the upper deck was enclosed and air-conditioned! Unfortunately the entire section was full and I had to sit on the first row outside/behind it. 20 minutes later we reached the end of the tour (my hotel is only 2 stops before that) and I was boiling once again; but I'd decided against having a wander around the Mall Of The Emirates even if the idea of snow was massively appealing at that moment. The good news is that most people were going in, so I got to grab a seat in the aircon bit. Mind you there was still only one stop to go, because I was on the blue route, one that isn't a loop. So from MotE they took us to Deira City Centre and booted us off with instructions to wait 15 minutes for the red route.
DCC is a shopping mall. Apparently it has over 200 shops but I only saw about 15, and they were all electronics shops. It was a good job I wasn't there by cab or the day before or I would probably have ended up buying a laptop, or camera, or camcorder, or all three. It was so cheap. Couldn't find any M2s though, which is the only thing I was actually interested in.
When red finally arrived I got a seat in the aircon bit which surprised me, DCC is not the start or end point for that route and I wasn't the first person to get on either. I'd already decided that I wasn't going to bother getting off this bus anywhere: I just wanted to see what Dubai had to offer, and in air-conditioned fashion.
Dubai doesn't have a lot to offer. I learnt a lot about the place from the guides, but what I learn didn't impress-a-me-much. Here's the "highlights"...
Dubai has one of the biggest desalination plants in the world and gets through [some huge number] of litres a day. Petrol in Dubai is cheaper than water. Oil was discovered by a British firm in 1966, exports started in 1969. Before '69 there were just 13 cars in Dubai, now there are 750,000 -- I assume, because the population is 1.5 million and 50% of people have cars. I guess a lot of people have more than one, because they're cheap (apparently). A metro is being built with 59 stations, "some of them underground", in an attempt to make the traffic problems a bit better. Traffic really is bloody awful, we got stuck in a few jams throughout the day and I'd already had that trauma on the way to the hotel on Sunday. 12km away is a bordering emirate called Sharjah; the guide said it would take longer than an hour to get there by road...
Dubai is a very safe city. There are hundreds of dhows -- boats -- docked on the creek with all their cargo piled up next to them, and this all goes unprotected and unmonitored overnight, such is the lack of crime around here. Bafflingly we were told "the crime rate is 1-2%", a standalone statistic which doesn't seem to actually mean anything. Of vague interest was that their law is split into 3 types: civil, criminal, and traffic.
There are 38 shopping malls in Dubai at the moment. There are going to be many, many more. Hence "do buy". Several of the stops on the tours were malls: MotE, Wafi City, the fake market (a market famous for, and revelling in, selling fake goods; watches, clothes, and the like), DCC, I forget where else.
Dubai's population at the moment is around 1.5 million, as I said above. 80% of these people are ex-pats (50% of the population are Indian). In a few years they expect the ex-pat level to be 90%. The reigning family (the al Makthoums) have been canny enough to realise they need a life after oil, which is going to run out inside 10 years, which is why there is so much construction going on. They are attracting businesses and tourists like crazy to keep the income flowing, and already oil accounts for less than 50% of their GDP. Basically Dubai is being turned into an enormous version of Vegas without the decadence. The oil money is all being invested in property development while laws are in place to ensure ownership remains in Emirati hands, and there are decent deals in place for what few locals there are too. For example, a Muslim couple that marries is given a villa and free electricity and water bills (don't forget, water is more expensive than petrol). Westerners aren't allowed to own property outright.
And that's really all there is to Dubai: five-star hotels and complexes, massive office blocks (all glass -- easy to get hold of with all that sand about), development and construction. Dubai is already, or soon will be, home to the biggest and best and most expensive of all this kind of stuff. The tallest building in the world, longest unsupported walkway between two buildings, tallest pair of buildings, most expensive hotel, biggest hotel, largest amusement park, .... in another neighbouring emirate there are plans to build a replacement airport. DXB is not too shabby as it is, but the new one is going to be twice the size of Hong Kong -- the island, not the airport -- and have five runways. Heathrow has 2.
An underwater hotel is being built in the gulf. It's going to cost $5000 per night. In contrast the most expensive one now -- the Burj al-Arab, which is a mighty impressive sight -- costs 4000 dirhams a night currently. At least I think they were the figures.
Dubai has no postmen. One of the reasons I'd arranged return airport transfer directly with the hotel was because I didn't relish the idea of asking a cabbie to take me to the address I had, which is a PO box, but now I know why. There are no postmen, if you want post you rent a PO box. This means actual road addresses just aren't that important, and basically my hotel didn't have one. Bit odd that.
Here's an aside: according to the TV, Qatar has 15% of the world's natural gas resources, and despite being tiny appears to be embarking on a development and marketing scheme even more ambitious than Dubai's: they're going to put in an Olympic bid. Qatar!
So that's what I know about Dubai. The tour itself went past shitloads of construction, a few nice already-built buildings, along both sides of the creek, through a residential area or two, past a couple of royal palaces, and along a few motorways. I saw a mosque or two and we stopped by a public beach. There are photos of loads of this stuff on flickr as of earlier today. I stayed on the red route all the way 'til the end, and then all the way from there 'til DCC where I changed back onto a blue to get me back to the hotel. This was also the route that went past the Burj. Unfortunately this third bus didn't have aircon: the upstairs had windows at the front but the roof was just a big, well, roof. I managed to stay in the shade thanks to the brim of my hat, the angle of the sun, and wearing long sleeves, but by jiminy was I hot come the end. Thankfully I'd bought a shirt at DCC so got changed (again) as soon as I got back to the hotel.
I had a few hours to kill and no room to sit in, so I sat in the bar. Had a lager or two, then another HILTON MEGABITE, and then I thought I'd have a Guinness. OH MY GOD I'm so glad I did. A hotel bar in a Muslim country and that was the nicest pint of Guinness I have ever had. But I wasn't silly, had no more, and got my 9pm cab. Unfortunately the traffic wasn't bad at all and I got to the airport earlier than expected -- earlier than check-in :-(
Dubai airport is a bit paranoid about security, I think. Firstly you go through a small security check to see whether you're actually flying or not; then you go through a proper security thing, with all your bags x-rayed and you metal-detected. Then you check-in your bags, and go through security, having your hand luggage x-rayed and yourself metal-detected. An enormously long walk (worse than Heathrow!) ensues before passport control, and then security. Finally I made it to the lounge and had a bunch of the free stuff listed previously. Got a bit jumpy about not being called for the flight 'cos it was due to leave in half an hour so I went to the gate, panicking a bit at the "final call" that was flashing on all the monitors. At the gate I had my hand luggage x-rayed and me metal-detected. FFHS! It's like the entire airport has OCD or something.
The flight was alright. I was almost falling asleep before we took off, but the food -- a "night cap" rather than full meal, given the timing; I chose a tuna salad which I didn't really like -- must have given me the energy to stay awake 'cos I managed to watch the entirety of Just My Luck. An OK film, not exactly typical me stuff though... then I had a couple of hours kip before waking up to the glorious view as photographed and posted in the previous entry. Breakfast followed, landing soon after.
Arrivals lounge time. I was a bit -- OK, a lot -- more apprehensive about this 'cos it's a lot more fat cat and out of the ordinary than a departure lounge but hey, this is the sort of thing I'm paying for. Turns out I didn't need to be apprehensive at all, I just walked in, gave a bloke my luggage in exchange for a token, and then queued up to be assigned a shower cubicle thing. After cleansing I went upstairs to serve myself a fry-up and just generally enjoy being the only person in the room who wasn't just about to head to work. Got up to leave but remembered that I wanted a massage, which I had no idea how to organise. Turns out you just write your name in a blank time slot on the sheet of paper outside the treatment room and then turn up at that time. 35 minutes spent reading CN Traveler magazine in the quiet 'sanctuary' room occupied me until my time came and Yee gave me a head, shoulder and neck massage for 15 minutes. Got up and could barely walk cos my muscles were all so relaxed.
3 buses got me home and, well, that's that. My next flight has been brought forward a day to Sunday, giving me 3 full days in Sydney before going to Auckland on Friday week. Result. Before that I'm off round me Dad's tomorrow, he's not doing great but there's not a lot anyone can do about it :-( he wants me to help him do some shopping though so I'll be off to Tesco I guess. Was going to go and see Gorgasm play tonight but I'm too knackered. Might see if Wooj or anyone else fancies a pint in Surbiton though. Loz? You reading this? ;-)
The Arabic breakfast I started the day with was alright, I suppose. More food than I could eat and I had a bit of everything it came with, but I wasn't particularly taken by the soup-type-stuff, the cheese didn't really taste like cheese, and the yoghurt was way too thick. Who knows what was what though? It included:
- Zaatar
- Foul medammas
- Labneh
- Haloumi cheese
Checked out and failed to get any cash from reception, but the hotel next door has an ATM so I was told to go there. It was about 1030 and within a split second of leaving my glasses steamed up. Thankfully the doormen are equipped with tissues to offer guests: I assume this happens pretty regularly.
By the time I got back from the Oasis Beach Hotel with 500 dirhams I needed to change my shirt 'cos I was drenched. I have no idea how people can live and work in weather like this, especially the thousands of construction workers. How are they not all dropping dead of dehydration or skin cancer all the time? And talking of construction workers I was given some idea of scale: the single project (albeit a bloody hefty one) going on next door to the Hilton is called the Jumeirah Beach Residence, and that alone employs 20,000 of 'em.
Oh yeah, 500 dirhams. That's about 72 quid at current rates, and given that the bus tour was 150 dirhams I figured it was a sensible amount to get out. After all I wasn't leaving until a lot later and I needed cash to eat, being unable to charge anything to my room any more. What I didn't know was that the machine was going to give me a 500 dirham note. Very glad I was buying the bus ticket before anything else, but FFHS if I'd just wanted a pint or summat that wouldn't have been fun.
The bus tour came on time and -- glory be! -- half of the upper deck was enclosed and air-conditioned! Unfortunately the entire section was full and I had to sit on the first row outside/behind it. 20 minutes later we reached the end of the tour (my hotel is only 2 stops before that) and I was boiling once again; but I'd decided against having a wander around the Mall Of The Emirates even if the idea of snow was massively appealing at that moment. The good news is that most people were going in, so I got to grab a seat in the aircon bit. Mind you there was still only one stop to go, because I was on the blue route, one that isn't a loop. So from MotE they took us to Deira City Centre and booted us off with instructions to wait 15 minutes for the red route.
DCC is a shopping mall. Apparently it has over 200 shops but I only saw about 15, and they were all electronics shops. It was a good job I wasn't there by cab or the day before or I would probably have ended up buying a laptop, or camera, or camcorder, or all three. It was so cheap. Couldn't find any M2s though, which is the only thing I was actually interested in.
When red finally arrived I got a seat in the aircon bit which surprised me, DCC is not the start or end point for that route and I wasn't the first person to get on either. I'd already decided that I wasn't going to bother getting off this bus anywhere: I just wanted to see what Dubai had to offer, and in air-conditioned fashion.
Dubai doesn't have a lot to offer. I learnt a lot about the place from the guides, but what I learn didn't impress-a-me-much. Here's the "highlights"...
Dubai has one of the biggest desalination plants in the world and gets through [some huge number] of litres a day. Petrol in Dubai is cheaper than water. Oil was discovered by a British firm in 1966, exports started in 1969. Before '69 there were just 13 cars in Dubai, now there are 750,000 -- I assume, because the population is 1.5 million and 50% of people have cars. I guess a lot of people have more than one, because they're cheap (apparently). A metro is being built with 59 stations, "some of them underground", in an attempt to make the traffic problems a bit better. Traffic really is bloody awful, we got stuck in a few jams throughout the day and I'd already had that trauma on the way to the hotel on Sunday. 12km away is a bordering emirate called Sharjah; the guide said it would take longer than an hour to get there by road...
Dubai is a very safe city. There are hundreds of dhows -- boats -- docked on the creek with all their cargo piled up next to them, and this all goes unprotected and unmonitored overnight, such is the lack of crime around here. Bafflingly we were told "the crime rate is 1-2%", a standalone statistic which doesn't seem to actually mean anything. Of vague interest was that their law is split into 3 types: civil, criminal, and traffic.
There are 38 shopping malls in Dubai at the moment. There are going to be many, many more. Hence "do buy". Several of the stops on the tours were malls: MotE, Wafi City, the fake market (a market famous for, and revelling in, selling fake goods; watches, clothes, and the like), DCC, I forget where else.
Dubai's population at the moment is around 1.5 million, as I said above. 80% of these people are ex-pats (50% of the population are Indian). In a few years they expect the ex-pat level to be 90%. The reigning family (the al Makthoums) have been canny enough to realise they need a life after oil, which is going to run out inside 10 years, which is why there is so much construction going on. They are attracting businesses and tourists like crazy to keep the income flowing, and already oil accounts for less than 50% of their GDP. Basically Dubai is being turned into an enormous version of Vegas without the decadence. The oil money is all being invested in property development while laws are in place to ensure ownership remains in Emirati hands, and there are decent deals in place for what few locals there are too. For example, a Muslim couple that marries is given a villa and free electricity and water bills (don't forget, water is more expensive than petrol). Westerners aren't allowed to own property outright.
And that's really all there is to Dubai: five-star hotels and complexes, massive office blocks (all glass -- easy to get hold of with all that sand about), development and construction. Dubai is already, or soon will be, home to the biggest and best and most expensive of all this kind of stuff. The tallest building in the world, longest unsupported walkway between two buildings, tallest pair of buildings, most expensive hotel, biggest hotel, largest amusement park, .... in another neighbouring emirate there are plans to build a replacement airport. DXB is not too shabby as it is, but the new one is going to be twice the size of Hong Kong -- the island, not the airport -- and have five runways. Heathrow has 2.
An underwater hotel is being built in the gulf. It's going to cost $5000 per night. In contrast the most expensive one now -- the Burj al-Arab, which is a mighty impressive sight -- costs 4000 dirhams a night currently. At least I think they were the figures.
Dubai has no postmen. One of the reasons I'd arranged return airport transfer directly with the hotel was because I didn't relish the idea of asking a cabbie to take me to the address I had, which is a PO box, but now I know why. There are no postmen, if you want post you rent a PO box. This means actual road addresses just aren't that important, and basically my hotel didn't have one. Bit odd that.
Here's an aside: according to the TV, Qatar has 15% of the world's natural gas resources, and despite being tiny appears to be embarking on a development and marketing scheme even more ambitious than Dubai's: they're going to put in an Olympic bid. Qatar!
So that's what I know about Dubai. The tour itself went past shitloads of construction, a few nice already-built buildings, along both sides of the creek, through a residential area or two, past a couple of royal palaces, and along a few motorways. I saw a mosque or two and we stopped by a public beach. There are photos of loads of this stuff on flickr as of earlier today. I stayed on the red route all the way 'til the end, and then all the way from there 'til DCC where I changed back onto a blue to get me back to the hotel. This was also the route that went past the Burj. Unfortunately this third bus didn't have aircon: the upstairs had windows at the front but the roof was just a big, well, roof. I managed to stay in the shade thanks to the brim of my hat, the angle of the sun, and wearing long sleeves, but by jiminy was I hot come the end. Thankfully I'd bought a shirt at DCC so got changed (again) as soon as I got back to the hotel.
I had a few hours to kill and no room to sit in, so I sat in the bar. Had a lager or two, then another HILTON MEGABITE, and then I thought I'd have a Guinness. OH MY GOD I'm so glad I did. A hotel bar in a Muslim country and that was the nicest pint of Guinness I have ever had. But I wasn't silly, had no more, and got my 9pm cab. Unfortunately the traffic wasn't bad at all and I got to the airport earlier than expected -- earlier than check-in :-(
Dubai airport is a bit paranoid about security, I think. Firstly you go through a small security check to see whether you're actually flying or not; then you go through a proper security thing, with all your bags x-rayed and you metal-detected. Then you check-in your bags, and go through security, having your hand luggage x-rayed and yourself metal-detected. An enormously long walk (worse than Heathrow!) ensues before passport control, and then security. Finally I made it to the lounge and had a bunch of the free stuff listed previously. Got a bit jumpy about not being called for the flight 'cos it was due to leave in half an hour so I went to the gate, panicking a bit at the "final call" that was flashing on all the monitors. At the gate I had my hand luggage x-rayed and me metal-detected. FFHS! It's like the entire airport has OCD or something.
The flight was alright. I was almost falling asleep before we took off, but the food -- a "night cap" rather than full meal, given the timing; I chose a tuna salad which I didn't really like -- must have given me the energy to stay awake 'cos I managed to watch the entirety of Just My Luck. An OK film, not exactly typical me stuff though... then I had a couple of hours kip before waking up to the glorious view as photographed and posted in the previous entry. Breakfast followed, landing soon after.
Arrivals lounge time. I was a bit -- OK, a lot -- more apprehensive about this 'cos it's a lot more fat cat and out of the ordinary than a departure lounge but hey, this is the sort of thing I'm paying for. Turns out I didn't need to be apprehensive at all, I just walked in, gave a bloke my luggage in exchange for a token, and then queued up to be assigned a shower cubicle thing. After cleansing I went upstairs to serve myself a fry-up and just generally enjoy being the only person in the room who wasn't just about to head to work. Got up to leave but remembered that I wanted a massage, which I had no idea how to organise. Turns out you just write your name in a blank time slot on the sheet of paper outside the treatment room and then turn up at that time. 35 minutes spent reading CN Traveler magazine in the quiet 'sanctuary' room occupied me until my time came and Yee gave me a head, shoulder and neck massage for 15 minutes. Got up and could barely walk cos my muscles were all so relaxed.
3 buses got me home and, well, that's that. My next flight has been brought forward a day to Sunday, giving me 3 full days in Sydney before going to Auckland on Friday week. Result. Before that I'm off round me Dad's tomorrow, he's not doing great but there's not a lot anyone can do about it :-( he wants me to help him do some shopping though so I'll be off to Tesco I guess. Was going to go and see Gorgasm play tonight but I'm too knackered. Might see if Wooj or anyone else fancies a pint in Surbiton though. Loz? You reading this? ;-)
the view from 12K
I was so tired on the bus home from the airport this morning I thought I'd put off writing a blog entry until later today, or tomorrow. But now I've been sat on my sofa watching TV and not sleeping, doh. Uploaded 116 photos to flickr and a few videos to youtube though. Still can't be arsed composing a full entry but this photo is worth putting here I reckon. Views like that are definitely one of the reasons I love flying. This was the view from my seat at about 5am this morning (UK time) IIRC, somewhere over Germany.
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Dubai, Dubai, we're leaving you Dubai
Right then. Busy day ahead today. It's 8am right now and breakfast arrives in an hour, then I have to go to the hotel next door to get some money -- unless reception will give me some on my room account, I hope so -- before checking out and going on a few hours of open top bus tour goodness. Although, hmm, there's a free bus to the Mall Of The Emirates at 1030 so I might get that instead. Whatever. What's certain is that my Arabic breakfast comes first and I've not got a clue what any of the things in it are, I hope it's nice. I also need to sort out the cab I've got booked to the airport this evening. Check-in opens 3.5 hours before the flight, and there's a lounge, so I'll probably ask to get there for about 2230 I guess.
Leaving that late gives me the chance to visit Studio One one last time. After the first night I was wary of bothering but it's the only bar -- not restaurant -- here so I thought I'd give it another go last night. Within 60 seconds of arriving I was greeted with "Hi, a Heineken for you Sir?", heh. Had 3 drinks -- the last ordered just inside happy hour -- and a Hilton Megabite burger which is THE GREATEST BURGER EVER. Oh. My. Gosh. It was phenomenal! First off I was a bit surprised at being asked how I wanted it cooked and chose well-done, but when it arrived I was taken aback even more: it was huge, and came with bacon, cheese, and egg. And when I took a bite I was in full-on junk food culinary heaven. It was so nice. I can't imagine it was any good for me at all but I don't care. I let it settle while watching sport on TV and listening to the fatcat oil baron pissed-up Americans who spoke very similar to the South Park residents in the "they took our jobs!" episode on the table next to me, then came back to my room for a couple of episodes of Renegade before crashing out.
Hoping that my travel agent can bring my Sydney flight forward a day today. She says expertflyer.com isn't to be trusted 100%, but even if it's remotely accurate then a bunch of seats that my ticket is valid for have become available on Sunday over the last couple of days. I asked her to look yesterday but forgot that it was a bank holiday in Gibraltar because Sunday was "National Day", doh.
Right. Time to have a shower and pack up ready for the day. Next time I'm online will probably be from the UK tomorrow morning, hopefully after I've sampled the delights of the Molton Brown Spa in BA's T4 arrivals lounge!
Leaving that late gives me the chance to visit Studio One one last time. After the first night I was wary of bothering but it's the only bar -- not restaurant -- here so I thought I'd give it another go last night. Within 60 seconds of arriving I was greeted with "Hi, a Heineken for you Sir?", heh. Had 3 drinks -- the last ordered just inside happy hour -- and a Hilton Megabite burger which is THE GREATEST BURGER EVER. Oh. My. Gosh. It was phenomenal! First off I was a bit surprised at being asked how I wanted it cooked and chose well-done, but when it arrived I was taken aback even more: it was huge, and came with bacon, cheese, and egg. And when I took a bite I was in full-on junk food culinary heaven. It was so nice. I can't imagine it was any good for me at all but I don't care. I let it settle while watching sport on TV and listening to the fatcat oil baron pissed-up Americans who spoke very similar to the South Park residents in the "they took our jobs!" episode on the table next to me, then came back to my room for a couple of episodes of Renegade before crashing out.
Hoping that my travel agent can bring my Sydney flight forward a day today. She says expertflyer.com isn't to be trusted 100%, but even if it's remotely accurate then a bunch of seats that my ticket is valid for have become available on Sunday over the last couple of days. I asked her to look yesterday but forgot that it was a bank holiday in Gibraltar because Sunday was "National Day", doh.
Right. Time to have a shower and pack up ready for the day. Next time I'm online will probably be from the UK tomorrow morning, hopefully after I've sampled the delights of the Molton Brown Spa in BA's T4 arrivals lounge!
Monday, September 11, 2006
that sunset (again)
Wow, it doesn't half set quickly around here. I decided to head out for a bit of a wander on the beach (and would have stayed out there except the hotel's private beach area was about to shut) and saw the sun set. Two words: I saw it set. I watched it drop and drop and drop until I couldn't see it any more, which took about 5 minutes in total. It was fantastic, and also meant I finally got familiar with a bit more of the hotel, ie the grounds and 2 more outdoor bars I'd only previously read about. I'm not a beach person so that's about as much beach action as I'm interested in on a holiday, but it was bloody worth it.
Watching a bit of CNBC right now, Morning Call (cos the US markets have just opened). I'm addicted to this channel even though I barely understand a word of it. It's just so hectic, with an on-screen clock that displays hundredths of a second, two different speed stock tickers at the bottom and non-stop guests being picture-in-pictured from all over the bloody place as they jump from industry to industry, trading floor to journalist to CEO/CFO to market analyst at lightning speed. It's fucking ace. But I'm not sure I'm going to watch it much longer; I'll either watch a couple of episodes of Renegade on DVD and get some room service goodness, or go to one of the restaurants/Studio One again. Oh - wait - CNBC just turned into a European station and I've found an episode of Simpsons to watch on a different channel. The Simpsons at 6pm, eh? It's just like being at home. But, wait, shit -- I'm trying to get away from being at home! GAH.
Watching a bit of CNBC right now, Morning Call (cos the US markets have just opened). I'm addicted to this channel even though I barely understand a word of it. It's just so hectic, with an on-screen clock that displays hundredths of a second, two different speed stock tickers at the bottom and non-stop guests being picture-in-pictured from all over the bloody place as they jump from industry to industry, trading floor to journalist to CEO/CFO to market analyst at lightning speed. It's fucking ace. But I'm not sure I'm going to watch it much longer; I'll either watch a couple of episodes of Renegade on DVD and get some room service goodness, or go to one of the restaurants/Studio One again. Oh - wait - CNBC just turned into a European station and I've found an episode of Simpsons to watch on a different channel. The Simpsons at 6pm, eh? It's just like being at home. But, wait, shit -- I'm trying to get away from being at home! GAH.
Jumeirah sunset
Ah, what a lazy day. Went back to sleep this morning and set my phone's alarm to wake me up at 1000. Unfortunately my phone is set to UK time, so it wasn't going to go off until 1300 local. I woke up of my own volition around midday and decided to go sit by the pool for a bit before maybe doing a bus tour. Despite being sat in the shade and barely moving I still ended up sweating like a bastard when reading a book for an hour outside so I changed my shirt and moved to the lobby. Turned down the offer of some Arabic coffee, as did everyone else in the area. The poor guy serving it looked pretty hurt, he kept offering it to loads of people and I didn't see a single person accept it.
Since then I've just been lazing the day away in my hotel room. The sun has been shining directly on my room's balcony all afternoon which makes it way too hot to sit out there, but it's setting now (almost 6pm here) and the view is spectacular. It'd be much nicer to sit there and take it in if there wasn't a huge construction site (of course) between me and the beach, but still... actually maybe with the time getting on the temperature outside might be just about bearable. I might go for a walk on the beach, innit.
early morning in Dubai
This is the first hotel room I've ever stayed in where there's been no BBC channel on the TV, I think. But there are plenty of English language channels anyway so it's no great loss.
It's 0515 where I am and I've been up for over an hour. Except it's not jet lag, it's because either I really did write "0400" on my breakfast order, or the "0900" I thought I wrote was radically interpreted. Either way I didn't bother turning it down when it arrived, even if they did have to wake me up to serve it. I don't really care much for normal waking hours or a typical body clock right now anyway.
What a breakfast it was 'n all. I'd put up a photo, but, well, flickr + Dubai... it was grapefruit juice, tea, a bowl of bran, a yoghurt, a huge fruit salad, some toast, some croissants, and a plate of scrambled eggs with 2 sausages, tomato, hash browns, and I'm sure there was something else too but I can't remember what it was. Room service for teh win anyway. I'll just be more careful with my writing (perhaps I'll write NINE) if I get it tomorrow too.
People have asked me "why are you going to Dubai?" a few times when I've been incessantly nattering about this trip. The answer is that, much like the whole trip but more so than any other city, I came to Dubai for the journey, not the destination. So being awake at this time of day and kipping during the day is fine by me. The thing about Dubai is that for the purposes of my ticket it counts as being in Europe, and I'm only allowed one trip to somewhere in Europe. This is about as far as it's possible to get, and being such a distance it meant I got to fly in proper business class, where the seat turns into a bed and all that jazz. So here's a report of what happened on Saturday and Sunday.
Went and got the cab from Station Cabs in Surbiton at 1830 on Saturday. Nerves were kicking in: a day trip to Gibraltar is one thing but this is the real deal, I'm off on me own to somewhere I've never been before and being out of the country for days. Yes, I know I'm going back to the UK on Wednesday, and I know it's a massively westernised destination, but still, y'know? I thought I'd try and have a chat with the cabbie but his English wasn't great and all I got out of him was that he was from a tiny village in Slovakia, the name so incomprehensible to my Western European ear that I fear if I tried to pronounce it myself I'd end up dehydrating from the amount of spit I'd produce.
So for most of the journey to Heathrow I was lost in my own thoughts. As it happens for the first few minutes I thought I was just plain lost. Well, I thought he was just plain lost, as we took the most phenomenally awkward route from Surbiton to Hampton I could conceive. I know avoiding Kingston town centre on a Saturday afternoon is a good plan but this route was circuitous to say the least; good job the airport fee is flat and not mileage based.
I've flown from Heathrow Terminal 4 before but in the past I've always gone by public transport. I know it has a separate station to Ts 1, 2 & 3 but going there overground in a car really does hit home just how bloody far away it is. It might as well be a different airport. It was also bloody chaotic, the departures area being utterly packed. Being unable to check-in online for my flights thanks to the old-fangled paper tickets I've been issued with I thought I'd try and use the self-service machines, but I can't even use those. If I had cardboard it'd be fine, but paper's a no-no. Thankfully BA employ people to help out the confused souls who can't operate technology and I appeared to be such a soul, despite my problem being a lack of technology. So the guy checked me in at this PC-type thing, gave me a boarding pass with the all-important "fast track" sticker on it, and sent me towards the Fast Bag Drop line.
Dropped my bag fairly fast and headed to security. At no point did anyone measure my hand luggage despite all the furore about the dimensions. There are these bin things all over the place in which you're supposed to put your bag and if it doesn't fit in easily then it has to be checked-in. The guy with his PC just looked at my bag and said "does that fit?", but didn't want any proof that my affirmative answer was actually correct. Ho hum. It's not like I'm circumventing anything -- I know my bag fits because I bought it precisely because it's the right dimensions -- but I had expected someone to check.
I'd been told where the lounge was, and after security I saw a sign too. I followed the signs, found gate 10, and succumbed to lounge blindness. I just couldn't for the life of me see the damn thing(s). When I finally did see them it was bloody obvious. Oh well.
My experiences inside the lounge have been recorded previously.
The flight was called at gate 8 and I went there, got on, took my seat. 14k is a rear-facing seat in the Club World cabin, on the right hand side of the aircraft. It's also a window seat directly over the wing. You have to clamber over whoever's in 15J if you want to get up for any reason, especially if the occupant stretches out full length pretty much as soon as you're airborne, which on Saturday he did. But I didn't want to get up anyway, so it didn't matter.
I love sitting in a rear-facing seat. Take-off and landing feel so different, much nicer, but it's also probably just because it's such a relative novelty. This is only the second time I've ever done it, and I know full well that the vast majority of people never get to do it. I also know some people hate it, which is totally alien to me.
I also love sitting in Club World. This is what the holiday is all about. Long-haul business class travel in a seat that turns into a bed, a fantastic service from the flight attendants, masses of room, and privacy onboard. The k800i has a flight mode which means you can use it on a flight (duh) but because it's a phone I get nervous turning it on onboard because I figure people may panic. But in Club World there's no such worries, because no-one could see me doing so!
Before take-off I was offered a newspaper -- took the Guardian -- and a drink. I chose orange juice but could have had water or champagne. Also got handed a menu for the food service which started pretty sharpish after we got in the air. I had salmon for starter then fish for main too, followed by some cheese and biscuits and a couple of chocolates, all washed down by 2 cans of London Pride. Meanwhile I watched the film Wah Wah, Richard E Grant's directorial debut I think, an autobiographical flick about his life in end-of-an-Empire Swazliand in the late 60s/early 70s. Good film, but I was a bit put off by the main character looking an awful lot like Pikey Jones.
Food cleared away, film finished, I set controls to BED and had a couple of hours kip. Decent kip too. I could have squeezed another hour out of it probably but decided against it. I just like flying too much and as I keep emphasising (to everyone else as well as myself), I'm on holiday and there's just no need for me to be all refreshed and alert or whatever upon my arrival. So it was 0640 (UAE time) when I woke up, we were due to land in about 40 minutes and breakfast was just being served, a fruit salad IIRC although I didn't write down what it was. Captain came on the tannoy telling us the weather was great, a little misty perhaps, and 28C already in Dubai. Ouch.
I was thinking about the whole being on holiday, in business class, thing, and just generally my whole trip. Plane tickets and train tickets are complicated things, as the companies divide up the tickets in a particular cabin/carriage, where the service for all passengers is identical, into a whole bunch of different prices based on things like advance purchase, flexibility and ability to cancel/refund, etc. So the business class cabin has something like 4 different prices available, maybe even more, for an identical onboard product. Similarly trains do the same thing, just go look at http://www.thetrainline.com/ and see all the masses of options you get. Anyway I figure certain aspects of (my) life are pretty similar to that. It struck me on the lounge, as a bunch of people -- on a Saturday night -- were all suited up and constantly on the blower, obviously working, and they probably work like bastards all the bloody time. And on the plane there are a bunch of people on their laptops, no doubt writing emails or documents or presentations or whatever. This is the price they pay to get business class travel: they actually work hard and earn it. On the other hand here's me, flying in the same comfort purely for leisure and able to sit back and enjoy it all. I've got a heavy discount basically: an easy ride, a ticket marked "don't have to work your bollocks off to get this". What a lucky twat, eh?
Anyway. I'm sat in my seat watching the map thing say we're 10 minutes (or was it 10 miles? I forget) from Dubai and then.. we start turning around and heading back over the sea. Eh? What's going on here? We're not even circling, just heading away. Curious. Captain comes on the tannoy again and says "As you've probably noticed, I promised we'd be landing about now, but instead we're heading in the opposite direction". Well, at least we've not been hijacked. We do land eventually, about 50 minutes later than expected and in the wrong airport. Turns out a bad fog had descended on Dubai, reducing visibility way too much and rather than hang around in the air wasting "valuable fuel" we got permission to nip down to Abu Dhabi.
I guess there's worse places to find yourself short on fuel than in the Middle East, eh.
So we land at Abu Dhabi and taxi towrads the terminal... but only get so far. Turns out we're not the only ones who had this idea, and Abu Dhabi is full and there's nowhere for us to park. Captain says he's on the blower to "London" and trying to "call in a few favours", which eventually means we get refuelled while on the taxiway. I'm pretty amused by this, again I imagine the businessfolk onboard are a bit miffed. And indeed I can hear a load of them on their own phones because the engines are off and we're allowed to use them. I use mine to blog, heh. Me, I'm thinking it's a pretty cool adventure really, although I am wondering what'll happen to my cab. I know they'll know the flight is delayed, but will they hang around? Who knows. Who cares! I'll just have to play it by ear when I get there.
If I get there, that is. We're on the ground for an awfully long time. While getting refuelled we're told to make sure we have our seatbelts unfastened, which strikes me as odd and is never explained. I'll have to go look that one up. But it's good that the in-flight entertainment is on, and I watch episodes of the Simpsons, Frasier, and My Family -- which to my shame I actually enjoyed. I put it down to sleep deprivation. The weather at Abu Dhabi looks to me like it's getting mistier too. Will we be allowed to leave here?
Well, yes, we will. At about 0925 we're told the plane is refuelled and ready to go but there's a plane in our way. So we get towed backwards after getting permission to take off. We've also been given permission to fly pretty low, 7000ft he says although it ends up being 9000ft, for the 25-minute or so flight up to Dubai. We're given the full safety procedure spiel again and then we're away. All I can see out of the window is sand. Apparently on the other side the view is fantastic, but I'm out of luck on the right. Oh well. By the time we arrive in Dubai it's 1044, 3h15m late. I dunno how far it is from Abu Dhabi but personally I'm wondering if we couldn't have just landed there and been shoved on buses or summat. Not to worry.
Immigration and baggage reclaim is pretty simple, and I'm enormously thankful to find an explicitly signposted "Hotel representatives meeting point" in the arrivals hall. I'm a little less thankful to find no Hilton guy, but it turns out he was just sorting someone else out and I find him clutching a sign with my name on it pretty sharpish. I grab a seat while he marshalls a driver for me, within 10 minutes I'm being walked out to the car park to the waiting taxi. Bloody hell it's hot outside, feels identical to how Mumbai was back in March, but the cab has great aircon.
Dubai is an enormous building site. There are cranes and construction projects everywhere. There is also masses of traffic, and my driver takes me a really long way round to the hotel to avoid the main motorway that, he tells me, it's almost impossible to avoid using in Dubai itself. We go past it and it really is totally packed. I'm told our journey will probably take about an hour, but we'll be on the move rather than just stuck; it would be an hour in a jam going that way.
I think there are 3 types of people in big demand, making big money, in Dubai at the moment. Firstly, construction workers. Secondly, car dealerships. But the people making the most money must surely be the guys who create artists' impressions (ie, err, artists) of what these buildings are all going to look like once they're done. Because the view, any view, isn't nice at the moment.
It's about midday when we get to the hotel and a porter takes my big bag from me before directing me to the check-in desk. I'm about 3 hours later than I should be but still too early for a room, which is to be expected as check-in time is 2pm. All hail fog and Abu Dhabi! While waiting in line I'm given a free pineapple juice, and when I check-in I'm given a voucher for a free soft drink in one of the bars in the lobby area while they sort out a room for me.
The hotel looks ace. I perch myself on a seat next to the window looking out on the pool area, which I note has an awful lot of shade, and a bar. The lady from check-in comes and gives me my passport, which I'd left at the desk, doh! Mind you that's par for the course: my credit card had been turned down on first attempt too, FFHS. By now I'm really flaking out, knackered and feeling a bit ill really. They told me they'd definitely have a room before 2pm and come get me when it was ready. This would be handy because I've no money to get another drink or something to eat, and no room number to charge it too. But 2pm arrives with no further contact, so I go back to the desk where they say oh yeah, sorry, here's your key and room number.
The room is freezing! I know it's a hot country and aircon rules, but it's way too agressive in here, so I bump the thermostat up a bit and get online for a while before crashing out. One of the channels is showing the last ODI between England and Pakistan and I fall asleep in front of it, waking up with about 15 runs left for us to win. A walk around the room to stretch reveals a "sorry about all the construction work next door, here's a complimentary bottle of wine" label thing on a table near the balcony. It is not attached to a bottle of wine. Not that I drink wine anyway, but really...
I go out onto the balcony for all of 10 seconds before deciding it's way too bloody hot, and retreat back indoors to do a bit of channel surfing, read the hotel guide and the local Time Out. After a while I figure it's time for a pint. This hotel has a bunch of bars and I plump for "Studio One", a 'sports bar'. Seat duly grabbed I order a pint of lager and a plate of fish and chips. It's just before 10pm which makes it happy hour, half price drinks, woohoo! Chelsea -vs- Charlton is on one TV, women's doubles at the US Open on another, and a few Arab guys are playing darts. They're as far from Phil Taylor as it's possible to be.
The pint arrives as does a bowl of salty popcorn, have it! The pint gets drunk and a second one arrives. But where's my food? It doesn't arrive by the end of the second pint either, and I ask about it when ordering a 3rd. "Did you order it from me, Sir?" the waitress asks me. Sigh. Yes, I did, about 90 minutes ago darling. It arrives within 10 minutes of chasing it up and isn't very nice anyway. :-( But once I've eaten it, and finished the lager, I get the bill and am intrigued to notice I've only been charged for 2 pints. Each thing I've ordered is timestamped and basically it looks like the entire first order just went missing: there's no happy hour pint (but free is cheaper than half price anyway!) listed and the time next to the food is the time I chased it.
So what's going on, then? It's a lovely hotel and the staff are all friendly but, well, something's not right. They forgot to tell me my room was ready, the complimentary wine is missing (I wouldn't have known it existed had the label not been here!), the food took forever and they served me breakfast at 0400 instead of 0900. WTF?
Anyway. It's 0637 now and I think I'm going to grab another couple of hours kip before trying to get myself on a shuttle into the town, although truth be told I might not even bother. A massage and a swim and a few hours reading a book outside by the pool might suffice. Could do with a photo of the Burj though.
It's 0515 where I am and I've been up for over an hour. Except it's not jet lag, it's because either I really did write "0400" on my breakfast order, or the "0900" I thought I wrote was radically interpreted. Either way I didn't bother turning it down when it arrived, even if they did have to wake me up to serve it. I don't really care much for normal waking hours or a typical body clock right now anyway.
What a breakfast it was 'n all. I'd put up a photo, but, well, flickr + Dubai... it was grapefruit juice, tea, a bowl of bran, a yoghurt, a huge fruit salad, some toast, some croissants, and a plate of scrambled eggs with 2 sausages, tomato, hash browns, and I'm sure there was something else too but I can't remember what it was. Room service for teh win anyway. I'll just be more careful with my writing (perhaps I'll write NINE) if I get it tomorrow too.
People have asked me "why are you going to Dubai?" a few times when I've been incessantly nattering about this trip. The answer is that, much like the whole trip but more so than any other city, I came to Dubai for the journey, not the destination. So being awake at this time of day and kipping during the day is fine by me. The thing about Dubai is that for the purposes of my ticket it counts as being in Europe, and I'm only allowed one trip to somewhere in Europe. This is about as far as it's possible to get, and being such a distance it meant I got to fly in proper business class, where the seat turns into a bed and all that jazz. So here's a report of what happened on Saturday and Sunday.
Went and got the cab from Station Cabs in Surbiton at 1830 on Saturday. Nerves were kicking in: a day trip to Gibraltar is one thing but this is the real deal, I'm off on me own to somewhere I've never been before and being out of the country for days. Yes, I know I'm going back to the UK on Wednesday, and I know it's a massively westernised destination, but still, y'know? I thought I'd try and have a chat with the cabbie but his English wasn't great and all I got out of him was that he was from a tiny village in Slovakia, the name so incomprehensible to my Western European ear that I fear if I tried to pronounce it myself I'd end up dehydrating from the amount of spit I'd produce.
So for most of the journey to Heathrow I was lost in my own thoughts. As it happens for the first few minutes I thought I was just plain lost. Well, I thought he was just plain lost, as we took the most phenomenally awkward route from Surbiton to Hampton I could conceive. I know avoiding Kingston town centre on a Saturday afternoon is a good plan but this route was circuitous to say the least; good job the airport fee is flat and not mileage based.
I've flown from Heathrow Terminal 4 before but in the past I've always gone by public transport. I know it has a separate station to Ts 1, 2 & 3 but going there overground in a car really does hit home just how bloody far away it is. It might as well be a different airport. It was also bloody chaotic, the departures area being utterly packed. Being unable to check-in online for my flights thanks to the old-fangled paper tickets I've been issued with I thought I'd try and use the self-service machines, but I can't even use those. If I had cardboard it'd be fine, but paper's a no-no. Thankfully BA employ people to help out the confused souls who can't operate technology and I appeared to be such a soul, despite my problem being a lack of technology. So the guy checked me in at this PC-type thing, gave me a boarding pass with the all-important "fast track" sticker on it, and sent me towards the Fast Bag Drop line.
Dropped my bag fairly fast and headed to security. At no point did anyone measure my hand luggage despite all the furore about the dimensions. There are these bin things all over the place in which you're supposed to put your bag and if it doesn't fit in easily then it has to be checked-in. The guy with his PC just looked at my bag and said "does that fit?", but didn't want any proof that my affirmative answer was actually correct. Ho hum. It's not like I'm circumventing anything -- I know my bag fits because I bought it precisely because it's the right dimensions -- but I had expected someone to check.
I'd been told where the lounge was, and after security I saw a sign too. I followed the signs, found gate 10, and succumbed to lounge blindness. I just couldn't for the life of me see the damn thing(s). When I finally did see them it was bloody obvious. Oh well.
My experiences inside the lounge have been recorded previously.
The flight was called at gate 8 and I went there, got on, took my seat. 14k is a rear-facing seat in the Club World cabin, on the right hand side of the aircraft. It's also a window seat directly over the wing. You have to clamber over whoever's in 15J if you want to get up for any reason, especially if the occupant stretches out full length pretty much as soon as you're airborne, which on Saturday he did. But I didn't want to get up anyway, so it didn't matter.
I love sitting in a rear-facing seat. Take-off and landing feel so different, much nicer, but it's also probably just because it's such a relative novelty. This is only the second time I've ever done it, and I know full well that the vast majority of people never get to do it. I also know some people hate it, which is totally alien to me.
I also love sitting in Club World. This is what the holiday is all about. Long-haul business class travel in a seat that turns into a bed, a fantastic service from the flight attendants, masses of room, and privacy onboard. The k800i has a flight mode which means you can use it on a flight (duh) but because it's a phone I get nervous turning it on onboard because I figure people may panic. But in Club World there's no such worries, because no-one could see me doing so!
Before take-off I was offered a newspaper -- took the Guardian -- and a drink. I chose orange juice but could have had water or champagne. Also got handed a menu for the food service which started pretty sharpish after we got in the air. I had salmon for starter then fish for main too, followed by some cheese and biscuits and a couple of chocolates, all washed down by 2 cans of London Pride. Meanwhile I watched the film Wah Wah, Richard E Grant's directorial debut I think, an autobiographical flick about his life in end-of-an-Empire Swazliand in the late 60s/early 70s. Good film, but I was a bit put off by the main character looking an awful lot like Pikey Jones.
Food cleared away, film finished, I set controls to BED and had a couple of hours kip. Decent kip too. I could have squeezed another hour out of it probably but decided against it. I just like flying too much and as I keep emphasising (to everyone else as well as myself), I'm on holiday and there's just no need for me to be all refreshed and alert or whatever upon my arrival. So it was 0640 (UAE time) when I woke up, we were due to land in about 40 minutes and breakfast was just being served, a fruit salad IIRC although I didn't write down what it was. Captain came on the tannoy telling us the weather was great, a little misty perhaps, and 28C already in Dubai. Ouch.
I was thinking about the whole being on holiday, in business class, thing, and just generally my whole trip. Plane tickets and train tickets are complicated things, as the companies divide up the tickets in a particular cabin/carriage, where the service for all passengers is identical, into a whole bunch of different prices based on things like advance purchase, flexibility and ability to cancel/refund, etc. So the business class cabin has something like 4 different prices available, maybe even more, for an identical onboard product. Similarly trains do the same thing, just go look at http://www.thetrainline.com/ and see all the masses of options you get. Anyway I figure certain aspects of (my) life are pretty similar to that. It struck me on the lounge, as a bunch of people -- on a Saturday night -- were all suited up and constantly on the blower, obviously working, and they probably work like bastards all the bloody time. And on the plane there are a bunch of people on their laptops, no doubt writing emails or documents or presentations or whatever. This is the price they pay to get business class travel: they actually work hard and earn it. On the other hand here's me, flying in the same comfort purely for leisure and able to sit back and enjoy it all. I've got a heavy discount basically: an easy ride, a ticket marked "don't have to work your bollocks off to get this". What a lucky twat, eh?
Anyway. I'm sat in my seat watching the map thing say we're 10 minutes (or was it 10 miles? I forget) from Dubai and then.. we start turning around and heading back over the sea. Eh? What's going on here? We're not even circling, just heading away. Curious. Captain comes on the tannoy again and says "As you've probably noticed, I promised we'd be landing about now, but instead we're heading in the opposite direction". Well, at least we've not been hijacked. We do land eventually, about 50 minutes later than expected and in the wrong airport. Turns out a bad fog had descended on Dubai, reducing visibility way too much and rather than hang around in the air wasting "valuable fuel" we got permission to nip down to Abu Dhabi.
I guess there's worse places to find yourself short on fuel than in the Middle East, eh.
So we land at Abu Dhabi and taxi towrads the terminal... but only get so far. Turns out we're not the only ones who had this idea, and Abu Dhabi is full and there's nowhere for us to park. Captain says he's on the blower to "London" and trying to "call in a few favours", which eventually means we get refuelled while on the taxiway. I'm pretty amused by this, again I imagine the businessfolk onboard are a bit miffed. And indeed I can hear a load of them on their own phones because the engines are off and we're allowed to use them. I use mine to blog, heh. Me, I'm thinking it's a pretty cool adventure really, although I am wondering what'll happen to my cab. I know they'll know the flight is delayed, but will they hang around? Who knows. Who cares! I'll just have to play it by ear when I get there.
If I get there, that is. We're on the ground for an awfully long time. While getting refuelled we're told to make sure we have our seatbelts unfastened, which strikes me as odd and is never explained. I'll have to go look that one up. But it's good that the in-flight entertainment is on, and I watch episodes of the Simpsons, Frasier, and My Family -- which to my shame I actually enjoyed. I put it down to sleep deprivation. The weather at Abu Dhabi looks to me like it's getting mistier too. Will we be allowed to leave here?
Well, yes, we will. At about 0925 we're told the plane is refuelled and ready to go but there's a plane in our way. So we get towed backwards after getting permission to take off. We've also been given permission to fly pretty low, 7000ft he says although it ends up being 9000ft, for the 25-minute or so flight up to Dubai. We're given the full safety procedure spiel again and then we're away. All I can see out of the window is sand. Apparently on the other side the view is fantastic, but I'm out of luck on the right. Oh well. By the time we arrive in Dubai it's 1044, 3h15m late. I dunno how far it is from Abu Dhabi but personally I'm wondering if we couldn't have just landed there and been shoved on buses or summat. Not to worry.
Immigration and baggage reclaim is pretty simple, and I'm enormously thankful to find an explicitly signposted "Hotel representatives meeting point" in the arrivals hall. I'm a little less thankful to find no Hilton guy, but it turns out he was just sorting someone else out and I find him clutching a sign with my name on it pretty sharpish. I grab a seat while he marshalls a driver for me, within 10 minutes I'm being walked out to the car park to the waiting taxi. Bloody hell it's hot outside, feels identical to how Mumbai was back in March, but the cab has great aircon.
Dubai is an enormous building site. There are cranes and construction projects everywhere. There is also masses of traffic, and my driver takes me a really long way round to the hotel to avoid the main motorway that, he tells me, it's almost impossible to avoid using in Dubai itself. We go past it and it really is totally packed. I'm told our journey will probably take about an hour, but we'll be on the move rather than just stuck; it would be an hour in a jam going that way.
I think there are 3 types of people in big demand, making big money, in Dubai at the moment. Firstly, construction workers. Secondly, car dealerships. But the people making the most money must surely be the guys who create artists' impressions (ie, err, artists) of what these buildings are all going to look like once they're done. Because the view, any view, isn't nice at the moment.
It's about midday when we get to the hotel and a porter takes my big bag from me before directing me to the check-in desk. I'm about 3 hours later than I should be but still too early for a room, which is to be expected as check-in time is 2pm. All hail fog and Abu Dhabi! While waiting in line I'm given a free pineapple juice, and when I check-in I'm given a voucher for a free soft drink in one of the bars in the lobby area while they sort out a room for me.
The hotel looks ace. I perch myself on a seat next to the window looking out on the pool area, which I note has an awful lot of shade, and a bar. The lady from check-in comes and gives me my passport, which I'd left at the desk, doh! Mind you that's par for the course: my credit card had been turned down on first attempt too, FFHS. By now I'm really flaking out, knackered and feeling a bit ill really. They told me they'd definitely have a room before 2pm and come get me when it was ready. This would be handy because I've no money to get another drink or something to eat, and no room number to charge it too. But 2pm arrives with no further contact, so I go back to the desk where they say oh yeah, sorry, here's your key and room number.
The room is freezing! I know it's a hot country and aircon rules, but it's way too agressive in here, so I bump the thermostat up a bit and get online for a while before crashing out. One of the channels is showing the last ODI between England and Pakistan and I fall asleep in front of it, waking up with about 15 runs left for us to win. A walk around the room to stretch reveals a "sorry about all the construction work next door, here's a complimentary bottle of wine" label thing on a table near the balcony. It is not attached to a bottle of wine. Not that I drink wine anyway, but really...
I go out onto the balcony for all of 10 seconds before deciding it's way too bloody hot, and retreat back indoors to do a bit of channel surfing, read the hotel guide and the local Time Out. After a while I figure it's time for a pint. This hotel has a bunch of bars and I plump for "Studio One", a 'sports bar'. Seat duly grabbed I order a pint of lager and a plate of fish and chips. It's just before 10pm which makes it happy hour, half price drinks, woohoo! Chelsea -vs- Charlton is on one TV, women's doubles at the US Open on another, and a few Arab guys are playing darts. They're as far from Phil Taylor as it's possible to be.
The pint arrives as does a bowl of salty popcorn, have it! The pint gets drunk and a second one arrives. But where's my food? It doesn't arrive by the end of the second pint either, and I ask about it when ordering a 3rd. "Did you order it from me, Sir?" the waitress asks me. Sigh. Yes, I did, about 90 minutes ago darling. It arrives within 10 minutes of chasing it up and isn't very nice anyway. :-( But once I've eaten it, and finished the lager, I get the bill and am intrigued to notice I've only been charged for 2 pints. Each thing I've ordered is timestamped and basically it looks like the entire first order just went missing: there's no happy hour pint (but free is cheaper than half price anyway!) listed and the time next to the food is the time I chased it.
So what's going on, then? It's a lovely hotel and the staff are all friendly but, well, something's not right. They forgot to tell me my room was ready, the complimentary wine is missing (I wouldn't have known it existed had the label not been here!), the food took forever and they served me breakfast at 0400 instead of 0900. WTF?
Anyway. It's 0637 now and I think I'm going to grab another couple of hours kip before trying to get myself on a shuttle into the town, although truth be told I might not even bother. A massage and a swim and a few hours reading a book outside by the pool might suffice. Could do with a photo of the Burj though.
Sunday, September 10, 2006
Well, I wanted an adventure I guess
Hmm. the blog entry prior to the lounge rage one wasn't as explicit as I meant it to be. The point I was (badly) trying to make was not that I was accessing the Internet from a plane; the point was I was accessing the Internet using my mobile from a stationary plane parked on a taxi/runway at Abu Dhabi airport, some 90 minutes or so (IIRC) after I was supposed to have arrived in Dubai. This shows what happened (in a somewhat cack-handed way; basically my 0730 arrival turned into a 1044 arrival):
more later. I need some kip. I've shitloads to write, but the worst thing is that flickr is banned in Dubai so I can't upload any photos until I get back to Blighty on Wednesday :-(
more later. I need some kip. I've shitloads to write, but the worst thing is that flickr is banned in Dubai so I can't upload any photos until I get back to Blighty on Wednesday :-(
Lounge rage
This was written last night on my laptop. I haven't re-read it since I wrote it and am just going to paste it in as-is, typos 'n all.
AAAAAARRRGH I'M SO ANGRY RIGHT NOW. It's sad, I know, but the reason I'm so fucking angry is because of my home ISP, PlusNet. See I've been trying to get online for way too long in this lounge in Heathrow Terminal 4 rather than sitting back and just enjoying the ambience, and I've failed. So now I'm going to get a(nother) beer and come back to write the rest of this fucking rant.
Ooh, London Pride out of a can, interesting.
So, PlusNet. See these BA lounges are wireless hotspots so it should be a breeze to get online for a bit, but I don't have an account with anyone. When the BT OpenZone page comes up and asks me who my account is with, though, I saw PlusNet in the list. Well that's who I've been paying (way too much) for my ADSL at home so I thought, wahey, this should be simple -- they can just shove whatever the costs are on my existing direct debit. Schweet.
OH THAT IT WOULD BE THAT SIMPLE.
Their poxy fucking sign-up website is a heap of total fucking shit. For a company whose entire business is, broadly, "the internet", you'd think they'd be able to write a simple fucking 3-stage site that lets new punters create an account and existing ones buy a bit of wireless credit. But fucking no, they can't. I got lost in a maze of never-ending redirects to pages I'd already seen, confounded by fully-filled-in forms (even the optional fields!) that claimed to be missing vital/required information, and just generally frustrated as FUCK. I use a Mac, which I figured was the cause of all the trouble -- lots of companies employ people to make websites who think there's only one type of computer and one type of browser out there -- and thought I'd hit paydirt when finally I flicked on Opera and managed to get it to work out who I was, from my existing ADSL account info, *and* accept my credit card number for 120 minutes of access. I got to a page called "ThankYou.html" which contained a Thank You message and some instructions on how to connect.
I followed those instructions and it doesn't know who I am and wants me to create a new account. Only now even Opera doesn't have a fuckign clue who I am. All in all I wasted about, I dunno, 40 minutes on this shit? Just so I could get online and check the Man Utd score, read my emails, just generally do a bit of meaningless browsing. Really I should have been enjoying everything this lounge has to offer, after all I've bloody paid for this holiday and should be larging it. I know it's only day 2, flight 3, but I feel like I've been an idiot already :-(
Don't get me wrong; before trying this I did have a couple of sandwiches, a bagel, and a can of lager, but that's hardly taking advantage. There's spa treatment available here, massages 'n shit. There's hot food and waiter service (I think) and spirits and wines (bleurgh) and here's me trying to get on the poxy Internet. I could even have just sat and read a book. For fucks sake, the number of people I've told that this holiday isn't entirely, or even mainly, about where I'm going, but about what I'm getting away from, and the strange kind of freedom the captivity of airports and aeroplanes and being outside of your home timezone gives you and here's me trying to log the fuck on, as if it's something I don't already spend most of my waking life doing.
Great. Now I'm fucking angry at myself as well as PlusNet. Blog entry over.
AAAAAARRRGH I'M SO ANGRY RIGHT NOW. It's sad, I know, but the reason I'm so fucking angry is because of my home ISP, PlusNet. See I've been trying to get online for way too long in this lounge in Heathrow Terminal 4 rather than sitting back and just enjoying the ambience, and I've failed. So now I'm going to get a(nother) beer and come back to write the rest of this fucking rant.
Ooh, London Pride out of a can, interesting.
So, PlusNet. See these BA lounges are wireless hotspots so it should be a breeze to get online for a bit, but I don't have an account with anyone. When the BT OpenZone page comes up and asks me who my account is with, though, I saw PlusNet in the list. Well that's who I've been paying (way too much) for my ADSL at home so I thought, wahey, this should be simple -- they can just shove whatever the costs are on my existing direct debit. Schweet.
OH THAT IT WOULD BE THAT SIMPLE.
Their poxy fucking sign-up website is a heap of total fucking shit. For a company whose entire business is, broadly, "the internet", you'd think they'd be able to write a simple fucking 3-stage site that lets new punters create an account and existing ones buy a bit of wireless credit. But fucking no, they can't. I got lost in a maze of never-ending redirects to pages I'd already seen, confounded by fully-filled-in forms (even the optional fields!) that claimed to be missing vital/required information, and just generally frustrated as FUCK. I use a Mac, which I figured was the cause of all the trouble -- lots of companies employ people to make websites who think there's only one type of computer and one type of browser out there -- and thought I'd hit paydirt when finally I flicked on Opera and managed to get it to work out who I was, from my existing ADSL account info, *and* accept my credit card number for 120 minutes of access. I got to a page called "ThankYou.html" which contained a Thank You message and some instructions on how to connect.
I followed those instructions and it doesn't know who I am and wants me to create a new account. Only now even Opera doesn't have a fuckign clue who I am. All in all I wasted about, I dunno, 40 minutes on this shit? Just so I could get online and check the Man Utd score, read my emails, just generally do a bit of meaningless browsing. Really I should have been enjoying everything this lounge has to offer, after all I've bloody paid for this holiday and should be larging it. I know it's only day 2, flight 3, but I feel like I've been an idiot already :-(
Don't get me wrong; before trying this I did have a couple of sandwiches, a bagel, and a can of lager, but that's hardly taking advantage. There's spa treatment available here, massages 'n shit. There's hot food and waiter service (I think) and spirits and wines (bleurgh) and here's me trying to get on the poxy Internet. I could even have just sat and read a book. For fucks sake, the number of people I've told that this holiday isn't entirely, or even mainly, about where I'm going, but about what I'm getting away from, and the strange kind of freedom the captivity of airports and aeroplanes and being outside of your home timezone gives you and here's me trying to log the fuck on, as if it's something I don't already spend most of my waking life doing.
Great. Now I'm fucking angry at myself as well as PlusNet. Blog entry over.
i'm on a plane
Well, this is a turn up for the books. 7! 7! 7 is my plane! ... as Danzig nearly once sang. Or as in Friday the movie, "i'm on a plane!!!". The flight to Dubai. I wonder if/when we'll actually get there.
Saturday, September 09, 2006
Say hello, wave Dubai
Just got back from booking a cab to Heathrow for 1830 and now have the time between now and then to kill. Laptop aside, I'm already packed! So I have time to talk about the tail-end of yesterday...
I forgot to mention what happened when I walked back to the airport in Gibraltar: I got asked for directions. I'm used to this, it happens to everyone all the time but living in London (and working in the middle of a touristy bit) it may happen more to me than some, I dunno. Anyway, the point is that being asked for directions in itself is not a rare thing; what was new was that I was asked
Not been asked the way to an entire country before, heh :-)
After writing all that stuff I read the local rag and yes, it did have a letters page. Can't remember all of them but the one which struck me was a complaint about some previous complaints about some anti-Bush comments recently made by Breed 77. You don't get politics and metal in the Surrey Comet letters page!
I had a second bottle of lager in the lounge, but non-alcoholic. Unlike the first bottle (which I put in the bin) I left the empty in front of me on the table, which ended up being the key to my forthcoming popularity: there was no bottle opener, and people had to ask me how I'd managed to open it. The answer was: with my own bottle opener that's on my keyring. One of the most useful things ever and I ended up opening about 5 or 6 different people's bottles over the course of the stay, heh.
No-one came to get people from the lounge when the flight was finally boarding (late) :-( but I noticed and went to join the queue. Meant to leave at 2030, ended up pushing back at 2109 which struck me as a bit weird. I think there's some 40 minute rule after which there's some degree of compensation BA have to provide, so 39 minutes? HMMM. Took off at 2117 after taxiing all the way to one end of the runway before pulling a u-turn just before I thought we were going in the drink, heh. The runway really is bastard short! The point of take-off is just on, or beyond, the road which crosses it. Unfortunately I'd not managed to see any planes landing or taking off in my time there but it must surely rule.
The BA (well, GB Airways) flights to and from Gibraltar go like this: leave Heathrow in the morning, go back to Gatwick, leave Gatwick in the afternoon, return to Heathrow in the evening. Because of this I thought it'd be the same plane as the morning one but it wasn't. For one thing the evening flight had little screens that came down every 3 rows or so which displayed the SkyMap thing (is that a Virgin Atlantic term?) showing whereabouts we were. Not really useful but I always find it interesting, especially because it meant I knew when we were over Madrid and made sure to look out. It looked ace, like some kind of crazy butterfly shape(!) drawn out of printed circuit boards or summat. It probably doesn't actually look that shape at all but hey.
Service was better onboard this time :-) a (very) hot towel preceded some pretzels and champagne -- which got topped up before the meal service. A choice of lamb casserole or spicy chicken pasta, I had the chicken (and a can of lager -- the flight attendant poured it out into a glass except it was 90% head, she said "sorry, I don't know how to pour lager" to me!). There was also cheese/grapes/crackers and some creme brulee. All very nice! Even got offered yet more champagne when they cleaned up the plates. I declined.
The captain came on the tannoy apologising for how late we were running and saying we were pegging it a bit to make some time up but would still arrive "late" at 2235 (we were due at 2230 on the timetable!). Can't remember exactly what time we did land but I made it to the bus station at Heathrow just after 2300 and got a 285. Tried to spend the journey reading but in the end just pretended to while listening to these 2 pissed-up 17 year old girls attempt to get any English/sense out of the 2 Lithuanian lads they were desperately trying to persuade to act as their boyfriends and get them into The Works in Kingston. Not sure it was going to work, the lads themselves seemed unable to say much more than they were from Lithuania and were going to Kingston.
Also on that bus a Far-Eastern fella got on and said he wanted to go to Kingston. He was in luck, since that's where the 285 goes (and terminates), but decided that wasn't good enough when he buggered off early. As far as I can work out this was because the driver had told the women who asked to be alerted when they reached Feltham that, yes, we're now at Feltham. Bloke says to driver "Kingston?", driver says "No, but I finish in Kingston", bloke grabs his bag and darts out of the door. Poor bastard. Welcome to England, here's Feltham at 2330 on a Friday night!
Got home pretty sharpish all things considered, less than 90 minutes from landing to opening my front door. Sweet. Today I've done little else but pack, upload photos and videos, and buy some factor 50(!) sun cream. Dubai's sun won't harm me!
I forgot to mention what happened when I walked back to the airport in Gibraltar: I got asked for directions. I'm used to this, it happens to everyone all the time but living in London (and working in the middle of a touristy bit) it may happen more to me than some, I dunno. Anyway, the point is that being asked for directions in itself is not a rare thing; what was new was that I was asked
Excuse me, is this the way to Spain?
Not been asked the way to an entire country before, heh :-)
After writing all that stuff I read the local rag and yes, it did have a letters page. Can't remember all of them but the one which struck me was a complaint about some previous complaints about some anti-Bush comments recently made by Breed 77. You don't get politics and metal in the Surrey Comet letters page!
I had a second bottle of lager in the lounge, but non-alcoholic. Unlike the first bottle (which I put in the bin) I left the empty in front of me on the table, which ended up being the key to my forthcoming popularity: there was no bottle opener, and people had to ask me how I'd managed to open it. The answer was: with my own bottle opener that's on my keyring. One of the most useful things ever and I ended up opening about 5 or 6 different people's bottles over the course of the stay, heh.
No-one came to get people from the lounge when the flight was finally boarding (late) :-( but I noticed and went to join the queue. Meant to leave at 2030, ended up pushing back at 2109 which struck me as a bit weird. I think there's some 40 minute rule after which there's some degree of compensation BA have to provide, so 39 minutes? HMMM. Took off at 2117 after taxiing all the way to one end of the runway before pulling a u-turn just before I thought we were going in the drink, heh. The runway really is bastard short! The point of take-off is just on, or beyond, the road which crosses it. Unfortunately I'd not managed to see any planes landing or taking off in my time there but it must surely rule.
The BA (well, GB Airways) flights to and from Gibraltar go like this: leave Heathrow in the morning, go back to Gatwick, leave Gatwick in the afternoon, return to Heathrow in the evening. Because of this I thought it'd be the same plane as the morning one but it wasn't. For one thing the evening flight had little screens that came down every 3 rows or so which displayed the SkyMap thing (is that a Virgin Atlantic term?) showing whereabouts we were. Not really useful but I always find it interesting, especially because it meant I knew when we were over Madrid and made sure to look out. It looked ace, like some kind of crazy butterfly shape(!) drawn out of printed circuit boards or summat. It probably doesn't actually look that shape at all but hey.
Service was better onboard this time :-) a (very) hot towel preceded some pretzels and champagne -- which got topped up before the meal service. A choice of lamb casserole or spicy chicken pasta, I had the chicken (and a can of lager -- the flight attendant poured it out into a glass except it was 90% head, she said "sorry, I don't know how to pour lager" to me!). There was also cheese/grapes/crackers and some creme brulee. All very nice! Even got offered yet more champagne when they cleaned up the plates. I declined.
The captain came on the tannoy apologising for how late we were running and saying we were pegging it a bit to make some time up but would still arrive "late" at 2235 (we were due at 2230 on the timetable!). Can't remember exactly what time we did land but I made it to the bus station at Heathrow just after 2300 and got a 285. Tried to spend the journey reading but in the end just pretended to while listening to these 2 pissed-up 17 year old girls attempt to get any English/sense out of the 2 Lithuanian lads they were desperately trying to persuade to act as their boyfriends and get them into The Works in Kingston. Not sure it was going to work, the lads themselves seemed unable to say much more than they were from Lithuania and were going to Kingston.
Also on that bus a Far-Eastern fella got on and said he wanted to go to Kingston. He was in luck, since that's where the 285 goes (and terminates), but decided that wasn't good enough when he buggered off early. As far as I can work out this was because the driver had told the women who asked to be alerted when they reached Feltham that, yes, we're now at Feltham. Bloke says to driver "Kingston?", driver says "No, but I finish in Kingston", bloke grabs his bag and darts out of the door. Poor bastard. Welcome to England, here's Feltham at 2330 on a Friday night!
Got home pretty sharpish all things considered, less than 90 minutes from landing to opening my front door. Sweet. Today I've done little else but pack, upload photos and videos, and buy some factor 50(!) sun cream. Dubai's sun won't harm me!
Gibraltar media
Videos are on my youtube page, photos are in this set on flickr. I've got a bunch more to write but it'll have to wait until later 'cos I've got stuff to do before heading to Dubai, innit.
The Rock around the clock
Wrote this earlier today on my laptop, just cut and pasting it in before collapsing into bed. It's been a 22 hour day!
As I type this I'm sat in the "Victoria Lounge" in Gibraltar Airport. The thing about that is, this isn't really an airport: it's RAF Gibraltar. And this isn't a lounge, it's a shitty bar upstairs in what passes for a departure terminal. Although I shouldn't call it shitty, as the drinks are cheaper than in Gibraltar town and the bottled beer is especially cheap (only 1.50!).
Mind you I'm not on alcohol right now. I'm fucked. I've had 1 glass of champagne (I couldn't resist it on the plane over this morning -- they explicitly announced that everything was free in economy class except for champagne, which was 4 quid a glass; it was free in business, where I was sat, so I thought it was rude not to, innit. Besides, I'm on holiday, and when else do I get served champagne at just gone 8am?) and 3 pints of lager and I'm a knackered wreck. The weather has been mental -- bastard hot as I crossed the runway this morning, then cloudy but humid as I went to the top of the rock, then really really REALLY bastard hot ever since.
Gibraltar is fantastic. It's like a little bit of Surrey, or maybe Kent actually, 1000 miles from England and attached to the arse end of Spain. The airport is just over the border but not quite on the rock itself, actually being in a kind of no-mans-land where the signs are still in both Spanish and English. But wander 500 yards that way and everything becomes English except for the side of the road you drive on.
But hold up, I should rewind, for the benefit of anyone who gives a monkeys about these things. My flight this morning wasn't at the proper gate, we all had to get a coach out to fuck knows where. At the end of the coach journey we were kept waiting for 10 minutes while a couple of bigger planes went past (get out and I fear the heat and noise would have killed us all), and there was a flight of stairs from the tarmac to climb -- at the back of the plane. It's debatable whether there's more kudos in getting on at the front (as per usual) and finding your seat straight away, or getting on at the back and walking beyond all the economy class seats, but anyway. I think we were all on at 0650, the time it was due to leave, but we didn't actually taxi to the runway until 0715, and didn't make it off the ground until 0739 :-( Apparently one of the taxiways was fucked, which makes the queue of 8 planes behind us a bit more understandable I guess.
Cruised at 33,000 feet for a bit, 35,000 feet for a bit, landed at 1105. No drink at the start of the journey and economy class food service started before business class despite there only being 3 rows of us, ffhs! I hope their food was SHIT. Ours was nice: English breakfast (2 rashers of bacon, 1 sausage, some potato cube things, tomato stuff, and scrambled egg), fruit salad, choice of bread, the aforementioned champagne (or any other drink, ...). Didn't get offered another drink throughout the flight which the snob in me thinks is a shocking state of affairs, the regular bloke in me thinks is pretty rough since I got offered a second drink to and from Germany in economy class twice this summer, on shorter flights. I think something was a bit off this morning, basically, but who knows. It was my first ever business class flight inside Europe so I can't judge whether it was normal or not, I can only assume it was.
Read my copy of Uncut magazine while onboard; I really must buy the Pierrepoint DVD.
So, yes, landed at 1105. Gibraltar has the shortest runway of any airport in the world, and it was both scary and fun to look out of the window to see nothing but sea until about 3 seconds before we actually touched down. Come outside and the road you walk along to get into town actually crosses the runway, and has a level crossing apparatus to stop cars and pedestrians while a plane is doing its thing. Haven't seen that yet but there are 2 flights due to arrive before my one leaves so maybe I'll get a video of it, I can see the level crossing from where I'm sat typing this.
Beyond there I just played it by ear. Well, by eye, really, 'cos like I said everything is English. I could have got a bus or cab but there was really no point, because as it happened within 20 minutes of leaving the airport I had walked all the way through the main shopping and drinking districts and found the cable car, which was the only item I really had on my agenda. 8 quid got me up to the the top of the rock and it was fucking superb!
First things first, the apes. There are free-roaming apes on Gibraltar, the only ones in Europe IIRC, and they live in two places: halfway up, and at the top of, the Rock. I went all the way to the top and eschewed the multimedia tour because the second I got out of the cable car I was mesmerised. I thought the apes were in a little sanctuary or summat, somewhere you could go walk around, not that THEY walked around where WE were. But they do -- they just do their own thang in and amongst the humans who come to gawp at them and the scenery. There were hefty grumpy old fuckers and ones that looked like they dropped yesterday, and every one of them was entertaining. I took a bunch of videos which I'll put on youtube and link here, and the photos will all be on flickr.
That wasn't all the top of the rock had to offer though. There were pretty good views of Gibraltar and the nearest bit of Spain, but what was most entertaining is that there was a cloud. A cloud that enveloped half of the rock, splitting it in two. I walked _through_ the cloud and took a photo of its very edge. From the east terrace the view was a terrifyingly eerie plain white, nothing but the cloud. From the west, a sunny and picturesque city- and seascape. MENTAL. Again, photos and videos on flickr.
The apes were definitely the highlight though. I took a corking video which demonstrates both their propensity to steal food from humans *and* their fantastic parenting/community skills. The way a whole bunch of them look after the little 'un is wonderful.
All in all though I was only up the top for about 25 minutes, half hour. There's not a lot to do, especially 'cos I bought the cheap ticket (for more I could have, err, walked down half way, through some gardens or something, and seen some more apes). The bar wasn't open and I didn't want to buy any tat or have a proper meal, and besides it wasn't even midday Gibraltar time (ie not even 11am UK!).
So I wandered back into town. Sexy Beast came to mind. It's hot. It's fucking hot. Fuck it's hot. I had to get into some aircon and sharpish. First thing I did was a bit of clothes shopping, just a new shirt (which, because I munt so much after wandering around in the heat all day with a bag on me shoulder, I've already changed into), and then I went to the pub.
While wandering the streets en route to the cable cars I'd realised that in Gibraltar, booze is pretty damn cheap. And by "pretty damn", I mean "very very". The prices of the bottles of spirits were terrifying. Well, in the pub, something else terrified me: the legal drinking age over (t)here is *16*! I can only imagine what the boozers are like of a weekend evening, sheesh.
Pint of Stella was 2.50 and, well, tasted like Stella. I wrote a few notes (from which I'm writing this) and after a while left.. to go to another pub.
People in Gibraltar are weird. Everyone's accent seemed to be either London or scouse, *but* they also all spoke perfect Spanish (I assume). On numerous occasions I heard (bar) staff chatting away in both languages to different people and flicking between them as if it weren't no thang. Most confusing, and impressive. The second pub I went into was a proper case in point because a mixture of Spanish and English(/Gibraltarians/Americans) came in while I had a very slow pint and the staff had no trouble whatsoever.
I was going to eat there, but can't remember why I didn't. I ended up eating in the town square outside a place called Latino's, where I had fish and chips. Pretty nice it was 'n all. It could have been anywhere though: Gibraltar is fucking FULL of boozers. I sense a trip or two here in the future (handily enough I _have_ to come back anyway!).
September 10th is Gibraltar National Day. Because of this the residents are displaying their loyalty in much the same way as we did during the World Cup: there are flags EVERYWHERE, in shopfronts and pubs and hanging out of people's windows (but not on cars). All English or Union Flags too, innit. Take that, Spaniards!Heh.
Right. My flight leaves in a little over two hours, which means I should be able to go and check in now. I picked up my tickets for the main trip as soon as I got off the flight and they're a huge thick bunch of paper tickets the likes of which I have never seen before. Accordingly I am going to go and try to use the very first one so I can get back to Surbiton tonight, but more important, get into the lounge and on the Internet so I can actually publish all this writing.
Hmm, I'm in the lounge now, but no internet. Not to worry. I'm such a terrorist! I failed to take ANY of the metal out of my pockets when coming through, probably still in a bit of a daze after the check-in woman raised her eyebrows so much at me claiming to be travelling in business class. Well I am, so fuck off.
So this is the "Peninsula Lounge". It's empty. I'm the only person here. I've got myself a beer out of the fridge and some biscuits and my laptop on a table while watching BBC news 24 on the TV. There are announcements going on outside but I'm ignoring them. The flight is ALREADY delayed by 20 minutes O I'm going to be here for 2 hours or so. This place is probably horrible when full but right now it's bloody awesome. My own private living room. Maybe I should start knocking back the spirits 'n all.
Few more people here now. I'm getting bored of not being on the Internet. Time to read the local Gibraltar rag, hope it's got a decent letters page.
As I type this I'm sat in the "Victoria Lounge" in Gibraltar Airport. The thing about that is, this isn't really an airport: it's RAF Gibraltar. And this isn't a lounge, it's a shitty bar upstairs in what passes for a departure terminal. Although I shouldn't call it shitty, as the drinks are cheaper than in Gibraltar town and the bottled beer is especially cheap (only 1.50!).
Mind you I'm not on alcohol right now. I'm fucked. I've had 1 glass of champagne (I couldn't resist it on the plane over this morning -- they explicitly announced that everything was free in economy class except for champagne, which was 4 quid a glass; it was free in business, where I was sat, so I thought it was rude not to, innit. Besides, I'm on holiday, and when else do I get served champagne at just gone 8am?) and 3 pints of lager and I'm a knackered wreck. The weather has been mental -- bastard hot as I crossed the runway this morning, then cloudy but humid as I went to the top of the rock, then really really REALLY bastard hot ever since.
Gibraltar is fantastic. It's like a little bit of Surrey, or maybe Kent actually, 1000 miles from England and attached to the arse end of Spain. The airport is just over the border but not quite on the rock itself, actually being in a kind of no-mans-land where the signs are still in both Spanish and English. But wander 500 yards that way and everything becomes English except for the side of the road you drive on.
But hold up, I should rewind, for the benefit of anyone who gives a monkeys about these things. My flight this morning wasn't at the proper gate, we all had to get a coach out to fuck knows where. At the end of the coach journey we were kept waiting for 10 minutes while a couple of bigger planes went past (get out and I fear the heat and noise would have killed us all), and there was a flight of stairs from the tarmac to climb -- at the back of the plane. It's debatable whether there's more kudos in getting on at the front (as per usual) and finding your seat straight away, or getting on at the back and walking beyond all the economy class seats, but anyway. I think we were all on at 0650, the time it was due to leave, but we didn't actually taxi to the runway until 0715, and didn't make it off the ground until 0739 :-( Apparently one of the taxiways was fucked, which makes the queue of 8 planes behind us a bit more understandable I guess.
Cruised at 33,000 feet for a bit, 35,000 feet for a bit, landed at 1105. No drink at the start of the journey and economy class food service started before business class despite there only being 3 rows of us, ffhs! I hope their food was SHIT. Ours was nice: English breakfast (2 rashers of bacon, 1 sausage, some potato cube things, tomato stuff, and scrambled egg), fruit salad, choice of bread, the aforementioned champagne (or any other drink, ...). Didn't get offered another drink throughout the flight which the snob in me thinks is a shocking state of affairs, the regular bloke in me thinks is pretty rough since I got offered a second drink to and from Germany in economy class twice this summer, on shorter flights. I think something was a bit off this morning, basically, but who knows. It was my first ever business class flight inside Europe so I can't judge whether it was normal or not, I can only assume it was.
Read my copy of Uncut magazine while onboard; I really must buy the Pierrepoint DVD.
So, yes, landed at 1105. Gibraltar has the shortest runway of any airport in the world, and it was both scary and fun to look out of the window to see nothing but sea until about 3 seconds before we actually touched down. Come outside and the road you walk along to get into town actually crosses the runway, and has a level crossing apparatus to stop cars and pedestrians while a plane is doing its thing. Haven't seen that yet but there are 2 flights due to arrive before my one leaves so maybe I'll get a video of it, I can see the level crossing from where I'm sat typing this.
Beyond there I just played it by ear. Well, by eye, really, 'cos like I said everything is English. I could have got a bus or cab but there was really no point, because as it happened within 20 minutes of leaving the airport I had walked all the way through the main shopping and drinking districts and found the cable car, which was the only item I really had on my agenda. 8 quid got me up to the the top of the rock and it was fucking superb!
First things first, the apes. There are free-roaming apes on Gibraltar, the only ones in Europe IIRC, and they live in two places: halfway up, and at the top of, the Rock. I went all the way to the top and eschewed the multimedia tour because the second I got out of the cable car I was mesmerised. I thought the apes were in a little sanctuary or summat, somewhere you could go walk around, not that THEY walked around where WE were. But they do -- they just do their own thang in and amongst the humans who come to gawp at them and the scenery. There were hefty grumpy old fuckers and ones that looked like they dropped yesterday, and every one of them was entertaining. I took a bunch of videos which I'll put on youtube and link here, and the photos will all be on flickr.
That wasn't all the top of the rock had to offer though. There were pretty good views of Gibraltar and the nearest bit of Spain, but what was most entertaining is that there was a cloud. A cloud that enveloped half of the rock, splitting it in two. I walked _through_ the cloud and took a photo of its very edge. From the east terrace the view was a terrifyingly eerie plain white, nothing but the cloud. From the west, a sunny and picturesque city- and seascape. MENTAL. Again, photos and videos on flickr.
The apes were definitely the highlight though. I took a corking video which demonstrates both their propensity to steal food from humans *and* their fantastic parenting/community skills. The way a whole bunch of them look after the little 'un is wonderful.
All in all though I was only up the top for about 25 minutes, half hour. There's not a lot to do, especially 'cos I bought the cheap ticket (for more I could have, err, walked down half way, through some gardens or something, and seen some more apes). The bar wasn't open and I didn't want to buy any tat or have a proper meal, and besides it wasn't even midday Gibraltar time (ie not even 11am UK!).
So I wandered back into town. Sexy Beast came to mind. It's hot. It's fucking hot. Fuck it's hot. I had to get into some aircon and sharpish. First thing I did was a bit of clothes shopping, just a new shirt (which, because I munt so much after wandering around in the heat all day with a bag on me shoulder, I've already changed into), and then I went to the pub.
While wandering the streets en route to the cable cars I'd realised that in Gibraltar, booze is pretty damn cheap. And by "pretty damn", I mean "very very". The prices of the bottles of spirits were terrifying. Well, in the pub, something else terrified me: the legal drinking age over (t)here is *16*! I can only imagine what the boozers are like of a weekend evening, sheesh.
Pint of Stella was 2.50 and, well, tasted like Stella. I wrote a few notes (from which I'm writing this) and after a while left.. to go to another pub.
People in Gibraltar are weird. Everyone's accent seemed to be either London or scouse, *but* they also all spoke perfect Spanish (I assume). On numerous occasions I heard (bar) staff chatting away in both languages to different people and flicking between them as if it weren't no thang. Most confusing, and impressive. The second pub I went into was a proper case in point because a mixture of Spanish and English(/Gibraltarians/Americans) came in while I had a very slow pint and the staff had no trouble whatsoever.
I was going to eat there, but can't remember why I didn't. I ended up eating in the town square outside a place called Latino's, where I had fish and chips. Pretty nice it was 'n all. It could have been anywhere though: Gibraltar is fucking FULL of boozers. I sense a trip or two here in the future (handily enough I _have_ to come back anyway!).
September 10th is Gibraltar National Day. Because of this the residents are displaying their loyalty in much the same way as we did during the World Cup: there are flags EVERYWHERE, in shopfronts and pubs and hanging out of people's windows (but not on cars). All English or Union Flags too, innit. Take that, Spaniards!Heh.
Right. My flight leaves in a little over two hours, which means I should be able to go and check in now. I picked up my tickets for the main trip as soon as I got off the flight and they're a huge thick bunch of paper tickets the likes of which I have never seen before. Accordingly I am going to go and try to use the very first one so I can get back to Surbiton tonight, but more important, get into the lounge and on the Internet so I can actually publish all this writing.
Hmm, I'm in the lounge now, but no internet. Not to worry. I'm such a terrorist! I failed to take ANY of the metal out of my pockets when coming through, probably still in a bit of a daze after the check-in woman raised her eyebrows so much at me claiming to be travelling in business class. Well I am, so fuck off.
So this is the "Peninsula Lounge". It's empty. I'm the only person here. I've got myself a beer out of the fridge and some biscuits and my laptop on a table while watching BBC news 24 on the TV. There are announcements going on outside but I'm ignoring them. The flight is ALREADY delayed by 20 minutes O I'm going to be here for 2 hours or so. This place is probably horrible when full but right now it's bloody awesome. My own private living room. Maybe I should start knocking back the spirits 'n all.
Few more people here now. I'm getting bored of not being on the Internet. Time to read the local Gibraltar rag, hope it's got a decent letters page.
Friday, September 08, 2006
On (well, in) The Terraces
I've been on football terraces before but never in a BA Terraces lounge -- until now. They let me in via the FIRST (class) desk too ;-) It's just gone half five in the morning and I've been at Heathrow an hour already. Despite loads of signs all over the show saying "check-in opens 2 1/2 hours before departure", it wasn't (no desks for any airlines were). Mind you I'd checked in online yesterday at ba.com -- which, incidentally, said this 'ere lounge opens at 5am, but security didn't start letting people through until 0515.
Ah well. It was quite entertaining to witness what would amount to an episode of Airport/Airline after watching so many actual episodes of them on TV this week. First, someone tried to go through security -- the staff line, at that -- despite being on a flight leaving from Terminal 2 (this is T1). Then a couple tried to take 5 pieces of hand luggage through, 3 of them way too big -- it's not like the restrictions haven't been on the news or aren't plastered all over this place on massive posters FFHS. And finally, the guy immediately in front of me in the security line hadn't actually checked in for his flight, and didn't seem to understand the concept either.
Ah well. An hour or so until I have to get on my plane. The bar/fridges full of alcohol I'm facing as I type aren't as tempting as it might be. I don't think I'll have a beer until I've got the means to return from Gibraltar firmly in my hand, heh. Might go and see if I can get a fry-up or some cereal though, innit.
Thursday, September 07, 2006
T minus 9 hours
Well, my first flight is at 0650 tomorrow. BA6898 operated by GB Airways to Gibraltar. I won't pretend I'm not nervous -- after all, the only thing I have for sure right now is an e-ticket and boarding pass that gets me to the Rock, one way! But I'm pretty certain everything'll go smoothly. Bit of an adventure tomorrow, although they do speak English and accept Sterling.
I just printed out a "48 hours in Gibraltar" guide to give me some ideas of what to do in the 7 or so I'll have, plus I've got a shitload of itineraries and confirmations from hotels and me passport in my new bag. I had to buy one because of the new regulations allowing only a 45x35x16cm bag as hand luggage. I did already have a bag (less than) that size but not really suitable for a laptop (ie with padding and the like). I'd looked in a whole bunch of places earlier this week and not found anything I fancied and this morning remembered that there's a luggage shop in Surbiton FFHS. Went in there and spoke to the guy who knew the required measurements and sorted me out pronto. Good boy!
Got my alarm set for 3am tomorrow morning and am going to go to bed pretty soon, see if I can't get the best part of 5 hours kip. Not going to be fun... but the day itself should be. Cab booked for 4am should get me to the airport for 4.30am, the lounge opens at 5am so I aim to double up on breakfast (lounge + flight) if possible, heh. Back tomorrow night but not in enough time to get back for a pint unless I paid for a cab, which I absolutely won't do from Heathrow, it costs way too much. x26 or 285 for me, innit.
I just printed out a "48 hours in Gibraltar" guide to give me some ideas of what to do in the 7 or so I'll have, plus I've got a shitload of itineraries and confirmations from hotels and me passport in my new bag. I had to buy one because of the new regulations allowing only a 45x35x16cm bag as hand luggage. I did already have a bag (less than) that size but not really suitable for a laptop (ie with padding and the like). I'd looked in a whole bunch of places earlier this week and not found anything I fancied and this morning remembered that there's a luggage shop in Surbiton FFHS. Went in there and spoke to the guy who knew the required measurements and sorted me out pronto. Good boy!
Got my alarm set for 3am tomorrow morning and am going to go to bed pretty soon, see if I can't get the best part of 5 hours kip. Not going to be fun... but the day itself should be. Cab booked for 4am should get me to the airport for 4.30am, the lounge opens at 5am so I aim to double up on breakfast (lounge + flight) if possible, heh. Back tomorrow night but not in enough time to get back for a pint unless I paid for a cab, which I absolutely won't do from Heathrow, it costs way too much. x26 or 285 for me, innit.
My old man
He's never been a dustman, nor did he ever say "Be a Chelsea fan". But he's getting on a bit, is frequently skint, and rattles when he walks 'cos of all the pills he takes for various ailments. He also has a car which last week showed a light on the dashboard which in layman's terms means "this is bad". The RAC were called and they came out and fixed it, telling him to phone back if it comes on again.
On Wednesday he came over to my place with a strimmer to give my lawn a bit of a tidy up, and on the way over the light came on again. Home he went, called 'em up again and they said right, we'll come and get it and give you a replacement car while we're sorting it out.
Yesterday morning he went and picked up that replacement car. He signed a form acknowledging that there was a scratch on one side and that the central locking didn't work using the button on the keys, you had to actually use the traditional key.
He and I were out and about later in the day, me in the centre of town looking for laptop bags and generally wasting a bit of time before meeting up with Jamie, John, and hopefully Hasty, in a boozer ready to watch England in Macedonia. Dad was in Morden doing a bit of shopping. I got a phone call from him, on his mobile, which is pretty rare but normally means he's sat at his PC wondering how to send an email or summat. Not this time though -- this time the call was "I'm in Morden, had a fall, already told the wife, the car's being taken back home for me, I'm waiting for an ambulance and I'm in a lot of bloody pain, hold on, the ambulance is here" and that was that.
Well, um. Not great news, that. Sent an SMS or two saying I probably wouldn't be at the boozer and headed towards St Helier hospital (it was a guess, but pretty likely that that's where he'd be taken). 2 sweltering buses and a sweltering train later I got there, and A&E told me he was there and I should follow the sign for "Majors", not "Minors". Christ. :-(
Got there and he was fine, actually. Well, not fine: his left arm's fucked because he's chipped the bone in his shoulder and is still in a lot of bloody pain. But he didn't hit his head or anything else, no skin breaks, nothing else but his shoulder. He's been given some painkillers and is waiting for his arm to be put in a sling. Unfortunately the place seems a little short-staffed, and the person tying the sling has to go and be taught how to do it first. FFHS! It was some trainee doctor or summat, knows her drugs and diagnoses but a little lacking in the physical side of treatment. So she puts him in a sling and does it fucking badly, and then goes to get a nurse to fix it. Fucking hell.
I get his shirt and jacket on and we leave, getting a cab back to his house. The replacement car is not parked in his spot. But the keys have been put through the door. Um... I go up the road to buy some milk and come back to make a coffee while he's on the blower to motability or the RAC or someone. They say yep, we delivered your car, you've got the keys right? Yes, we've got the keys, but no car. OK, they'll call back.
Call back they do and the news isn't good. This is your address? Yup. You've got the keys? Yup. And the car's not outside? Nope. well it's been stolen then. You what? Yep, stolen. Go call the police and then get them to call us. Great. Theory is the driver who left it didn't realise the central locking remote was fucked so it was probably the easiest car to steal there's ever been. To top it off, inside the car is a bunch of paperwork, his disabled badges, and a bit of shopping plus some stuff for his wife (who's in hospital 'n all). All gone and, to top it off, this all comes under his insurance. Got a bit of a fight on our hands there I reckon.
Sigh. This is all we/he fucking needs. Dad dials 999 and I hang that up before it's answered. It takes a couple of minutes to explain that the car that isn't his being nicked while he's unable to drive anyway is not an emergency 999 issue and he could get in trouble for abusing the service, and should instead phone the local nick. I get through, kind of; he calls Wimbledon nick and doesn't get through. He says again that he wants to use 999 but I succeed in stopping him. Mitcham nick also doesn't answer, but Wimbledon nick does on second attempt. He's left on hold for 45 minutes though before they take his details and say they can't do anything more until the morning. Well, at least that proves it wasn't an emergency.
For fucks sake, what a day. There's not a lot more I can do for Dad 'cos he's mobile, right handed, and can get himself around and make coffee and use both hands (it's only the shoulder that's busted), the phone, the PC, etc. So I come home and watch England's second half (gwan Crouch!) followed by Green Street, then stay up 'til gone 2am watching youtube videos of thrash metal bands (including finding myself as per the previous post). I also had 4 cans of lager 'cos by 'eck did I need a beer after all that.
I was woken up this morning by a phone call from my Dad. Wasn't expecting good news but actually got some: the car wasn't nicked, they'd parked it round the corner in a different road. For fucks sake! He's got his own marked-out disabled spot in front of his house, the house through whose letterbox they posted the keys. Why the fuck did they park it round the corner? Sheesh. But nonetheless, yes, this is good news. Not stolen by pikey scrotes, no insurance hassles, no lost paperwork. Phew.
I need a bloody holiday. Good job I've got one booked, but up until actually seeing him in A&E I thought it was going to have to be cancelled. "Majors"! But he wants me to go away still, in fact he insists on it. And truth be told, I want to go. I'm also not entirely convinced it's that bad an idea... the worst is over with his shoulder, he just has to take painkillers and go back to the fracture clinic tomorrow and have his sling taken off after a while. He can do everything he normally does but drive and is more than content to get buses (for free, Freedom Pass-tastic) to get around in the meantime. And I can't drive anyway so can't help with that. So I guess I should check-in for tomorrow morning's flight and go out to buy a bag/case or two, finally.
On Wednesday he came over to my place with a strimmer to give my lawn a bit of a tidy up, and on the way over the light came on again. Home he went, called 'em up again and they said right, we'll come and get it and give you a replacement car while we're sorting it out.
Yesterday morning he went and picked up that replacement car. He signed a form acknowledging that there was a scratch on one side and that the central locking didn't work using the button on the keys, you had to actually use the traditional key.
He and I were out and about later in the day, me in the centre of town looking for laptop bags and generally wasting a bit of time before meeting up with Jamie, John, and hopefully Hasty, in a boozer ready to watch England in Macedonia. Dad was in Morden doing a bit of shopping. I got a phone call from him, on his mobile, which is pretty rare but normally means he's sat at his PC wondering how to send an email or summat. Not this time though -- this time the call was "I'm in Morden, had a fall, already told the wife, the car's being taken back home for me, I'm waiting for an ambulance and I'm in a lot of bloody pain, hold on, the ambulance is here" and that was that.
Well, um. Not great news, that. Sent an SMS or two saying I probably wouldn't be at the boozer and headed towards St Helier hospital (it was a guess, but pretty likely that that's where he'd be taken). 2 sweltering buses and a sweltering train later I got there, and A&E told me he was there and I should follow the sign for "Majors", not "Minors". Christ. :-(
Got there and he was fine, actually. Well, not fine: his left arm's fucked because he's chipped the bone in his shoulder and is still in a lot of bloody pain. But he didn't hit his head or anything else, no skin breaks, nothing else but his shoulder. He's been given some painkillers and is waiting for his arm to be put in a sling. Unfortunately the place seems a little short-staffed, and the person tying the sling has to go and be taught how to do it first. FFHS! It was some trainee doctor or summat, knows her drugs and diagnoses but a little lacking in the physical side of treatment. So she puts him in a sling and does it fucking badly, and then goes to get a nurse to fix it. Fucking hell.
I get his shirt and jacket on and we leave, getting a cab back to his house. The replacement car is not parked in his spot. But the keys have been put through the door. Um... I go up the road to buy some milk and come back to make a coffee while he's on the blower to motability or the RAC or someone. They say yep, we delivered your car, you've got the keys right? Yes, we've got the keys, but no car. OK, they'll call back.
Call back they do and the news isn't good. This is your address? Yup. You've got the keys? Yup. And the car's not outside? Nope. well it's been stolen then. You what? Yep, stolen. Go call the police and then get them to call us. Great. Theory is the driver who left it didn't realise the central locking remote was fucked so it was probably the easiest car to steal there's ever been. To top it off, inside the car is a bunch of paperwork, his disabled badges, and a bit of shopping plus some stuff for his wife (who's in hospital 'n all). All gone and, to top it off, this all comes under his insurance. Got a bit of a fight on our hands there I reckon.
Sigh. This is all we/he fucking needs. Dad dials 999 and I hang that up before it's answered. It takes a couple of minutes to explain that the car that isn't his being nicked while he's unable to drive anyway is not an emergency 999 issue and he could get in trouble for abusing the service, and should instead phone the local nick. I get through, kind of; he calls Wimbledon nick and doesn't get through. He says again that he wants to use 999 but I succeed in stopping him. Mitcham nick also doesn't answer, but Wimbledon nick does on second attempt. He's left on hold for 45 minutes though before they take his details and say they can't do anything more until the morning. Well, at least that proves it wasn't an emergency.
For fucks sake, what a day. There's not a lot more I can do for Dad 'cos he's mobile, right handed, and can get himself around and make coffee and use both hands (it's only the shoulder that's busted), the phone, the PC, etc. So I come home and watch England's second half (gwan Crouch!) followed by Green Street, then stay up 'til gone 2am watching youtube videos of thrash metal bands (including finding myself as per the previous post). I also had 4 cans of lager 'cos by 'eck did I need a beer after all that.
I was woken up this morning by a phone call from my Dad. Wasn't expecting good news but actually got some: the car wasn't nicked, they'd parked it round the corner in a different road. For fucks sake! He's got his own marked-out disabled spot in front of his house, the house through whose letterbox they posted the keys. Why the fuck did they park it round the corner? Sheesh. But nonetheless, yes, this is good news. Not stolen by pikey scrotes, no insurance hassles, no lost paperwork. Phew.
I need a bloody holiday. Good job I've got one booked, but up until actually seeing him in A&E I thought it was going to have to be cancelled. "Majors"! But he wants me to go away still, in fact he insists on it. And truth be told, I want to go. I'm also not entirely convinced it's that bad an idea... the worst is over with his shoulder, he just has to take painkillers and go back to the fracture clinic tomorrow and have his sling taken off after a while. He can do everything he normally does but drive and is more than content to get buses (for free, Freedom Pass-tastic) to get around in the meantime. And I can't drive anyway so can't help with that. So I guess I should check-in for tomorrow morning's flight and go out to buy a bag/case or two, finally.
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
MONSTER THICKBURGER
Thanks to the show already being available on Listen Again I managed to get the name and look up a link:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6498304
Dunno if this is worse than BK's effort, but bloody hell...
Mega-burger eat your heart out
Or perhaps eat til your heart gives out. Radio 4 is doing a show about burgers like the Stacker Quad, right now (0150, hmm)! Some guy from Hardy's(?) just described an incredible thing that may be even worse...
Monday, September 04, 2006
Fire engine called to Primark in Kingston
Fire engine called to Primark in Kingston today. I didn't manage to get a photo but there was a huge scrum of people outside who had, I assume, been evacuated. It was open again by the time I went past it again 45 minutes or so later, before I saw that I was half expecting it to appear in the local rag this week:
Discount retailer Primark today suffered a setback in their flagship Kingston-upon-Thames store as fire ripped through the building. A spokesman said that all merchandise in the shop was destroyed and accordingly an insurance claim for 58 quid had already been placed.
Violence is golden
Watching Desperado at the moment. I'm sure I've seen a film just like this, with Antonio Banderas in it even, but not actually this film. Not sure what it might be or whether I'm just making it up or what. Either way, this is pretty good so far (been watching for about 40 minutes, after giving up on I'm Gonna Git You Sucka because I'd missed the first 30 or so minutes, and because it wasn't as good as my memory had told me it was). Banderas just shot a shitload of people up in the bar where most of the action so far has taken place and he had a very nice line in shooting from behind his back, and kind of flicking his gun at people. Hmm, and right now he's covered in blood.
It's the 3rd film I've watched today. Or is it 4? Hold on, let me count.
4 it is then. Numbers 2 and 3 on the same day (and, in fact, back to back) might prove a little much for some people because they are so damn similar, but I bloody loved it. Danny Dyer is superb, and there being so many other actors in both films wasn't that off-putting at all. In fact it may have been more off-putting had they been playing radically different characters in each, but since they were playing nigh-on identical ones it was fine.
One thing The Business and The Football Factory prove are that something I was chatting about with Nige and Wooj yesterday definitely holds true: the British swear better than anyone else. Now, I'm aware my opinion is only really valid when talking about the English language, because in reality I've no idea at all what a stream of expletives in any other language sounds like, but we've really got it down pat for our eponymous tongue. The yanks can say fuck and bullshit fairly well but are useless at saying cunt, and don't have a clue about wanker and bollocks. Aussies and Kiwis are pretty rubbish 'n all. But Scots do it well, northerners do it well, and Londoners do it superbly.
Watching 4 films in a day probably gives away the fact that I've been monstrously lazy. But y'know, it's a Sunday and I'm on a 2 month holiday, so fuck it. There'll be a lot more films to come. I want to go see Snakes On a Plane before buggering off but I dunno if I'll find the time. One thing I definitely need to do this week is catch up with John and Hasty who have both been trying to get hold of me over the past 2 or 3 days and I've been really fucking rudely slack in getting back to them (ie, I haven't yet) :-(
Oh, hold on, I've seen 5 films today, 'cos I also watched Jet Li's "Twin Warriors". That was superb. Masses of wirework, definitely no Ong Bak, and an intro that went on for way too long, but an enormous amount of fight scenes and having Michelle Yeoh in a film is a definite recipe for success (I became a fan after seeing Wing Chun t'other night, although I'm sure I've seen her in other stuff too). Twin Warriors fooled me a bit though. Not strictly a revenge flick, it's about 2 tearaways who are (obviously) fantastic at kung-fu but a bit rubbish at the whole discipline-and-being-a-good-monk thing, so they get booted out of the Shaolin school in which they group up and learnt their shit and go their separate ways. It's the time spent as kids that makes the intro too long, although it also takes an awful long time for them to actually separate, because there's a good chunk spent being non-monk tearaways too. But once the plot kicks in it's mainly fight after fight after fight, except for a pretty odd sequence where Jet Li turns into a mental before a montage fixes him up. The ending is the bit that really fooled me though, and I won't spoil it here despite knowing deep down that no-one reads my blog (and certainly not for film reviews or recommendations).
The films on BA out of Europe in September look rubbish. I keep forgetting they don't have video on demand and am wondering if I can shove myself on a Qantas(-operated) flight to Sydney in a couple of weeks.
Heh. I come up on google if you search for vsnotplctz now, despite chris's attempt to steal that honour from me.
It's the 3rd film I've watched today. Or is it 4? Hold on, let me count.
4 it is then. Numbers 2 and 3 on the same day (and, in fact, back to back) might prove a little much for some people because they are so damn similar, but I bloody loved it. Danny Dyer is superb, and there being so many other actors in both films wasn't that off-putting at all. In fact it may have been more off-putting had they been playing radically different characters in each, but since they were playing nigh-on identical ones it was fine.
One thing The Business and The Football Factory prove are that something I was chatting about with Nige and Wooj yesterday definitely holds true: the British swear better than anyone else. Now, I'm aware my opinion is only really valid when talking about the English language, because in reality I've no idea at all what a stream of expletives in any other language sounds like, but we've really got it down pat for our eponymous tongue. The yanks can say fuck and bullshit fairly well but are useless at saying cunt, and don't have a clue about wanker and bollocks. Aussies and Kiwis are pretty rubbish 'n all. But Scots do it well, northerners do it well, and Londoners do it superbly.
Watching 4 films in a day probably gives away the fact that I've been monstrously lazy. But y'know, it's a Sunday and I'm on a 2 month holiday, so fuck it. There'll be a lot more films to come. I want to go see Snakes On a Plane before buggering off but I dunno if I'll find the time. One thing I definitely need to do this week is catch up with John and Hasty who have both been trying to get hold of me over the past 2 or 3 days and I've been really fucking rudely slack in getting back to them (ie, I haven't yet) :-(
Oh, hold on, I've seen 5 films today, 'cos I also watched Jet Li's "Twin Warriors". That was superb. Masses of wirework, definitely no Ong Bak, and an intro that went on for way too long, but an enormous amount of fight scenes and having Michelle Yeoh in a film is a definite recipe for success (I became a fan after seeing Wing Chun t'other night, although I'm sure I've seen her in other stuff too). Twin Warriors fooled me a bit though. Not strictly a revenge flick, it's about 2 tearaways who are (obviously) fantastic at kung-fu but a bit rubbish at the whole discipline-and-being-a-good-monk thing, so they get booted out of the Shaolin school in which they group up and learnt their shit and go their separate ways. It's the time spent as kids that makes the intro too long, although it also takes an awful long time for them to actually separate, because there's a good chunk spent being non-monk tearaways too. But once the plot kicks in it's mainly fight after fight after fight, except for a pretty odd sequence where Jet Li turns into a mental before a montage fixes him up. The ending is the bit that really fooled me though, and I won't spoil it here despite knowing deep down that no-one reads my blog (and certainly not for film reviews or recommendations).
The films on BA out of Europe in September look rubbish. I keep forgetting they don't have video on demand and am wondering if I can shove myself on a Qantas(-operated) flight to Sydney in a couple of weeks.
Heh. I come up on google if you search for vsnotplctz now, despite chris's attempt to steal that honour from me.
Sunday, September 03, 2006
dryer days ahead
By 'eck was yesterday ever a big 'un. I wasn't feeling too shabby after Friday, and managed to get into town perfectly timed to meet Nige off his train down from Manchester. Turned down his offer of a cheese and ham pastry 'cos I was determined to buy a breakfast in the boozer which we were heading to. Ended up not eating, drinking loads, chatting lots of shit, meeting Ben, meeting Mark, then leaving halfway through the England game because a shitload of proper trouble turned up, escorted by a van load of coppers. Didn't see any trouble actually kick off but a pretty scary atmosphere descended over the pub about 5 minutes after they all arrived. We moved pub for the second half and then headed to Waterloo (Markless) for a few more drinks with Wooj in the Hole In The Wall. Left there way before closing to go get a curry in the Raj, in which we ended up being the last punters.
Felt pretty fucking dreadful again today. Already broke my "no alcohol 'til Friday" thing by having about 3/4 of a pint of Guinness over lunch, oh well. Just watched My Cousin Vinny which was pretty good and now I've got Brazil -vs- Argentina on TV while I'm ripping my new CDs.
Really surprised to see that some my my youtube videos have been viewed over 100, or 200, times! Obviously I'm not video-blogging-geriatric or whatever but I'm easily pleased.
Felt pretty fucking dreadful again today. Already broke my "no alcohol 'til Friday" thing by having about 3/4 of a pint of Guinness over lunch, oh well. Just watched My Cousin Vinny which was pretty good and now I've got Brazil -vs- Argentina on TV while I'm ripping my new CDs.
Really surprised to see that some my my youtube videos have been viewed over 100, or 200, times! Obviously I'm not video-blogging-geriatric or whatever but I'm easily pleased.
Saturday, September 02, 2006
lighter days ahead
So that's it then. No work for me for the next 2 months, and in less than a week I start my amazing exercise in profligacy. I got into the swing of things yesterday by accidentally spending £100 on CDs and DVDs. I had a plan to buy the new Terrorizer album, but Virgin at Piccadilly didn't have it. What they did have was a 5-for-£30 DVD sale, and I was with film fan Geoff who recommended The History Of Violence to me. Then I spotted The Business, and obviously needed another 3... ended up with The Devil's Rejects, erm, and two others that I can't remember now and the bag with them in is in the other room.
After buying those we went for a pint in the middle of Soho (having been propositioned by 2 whores on the way) and actually had 3. This solved the really bad hangover I was having that the aircon in Virgin had made worse. The hangover was caused by Thursday having been my last day at work until November, a fact I felt necessary to celebrate by having way too much to drink. Ahem. Never going to "Plyr" again though, what a horrifying place...
Anyway, yesterday, after those pints I dragged Geoff deeper into Soho 'cos I still wanted the Terrorizer album. Went in Mister CD and came out with 2 purchases, neither of them by Terrorier. OK, this is it, last stop I promise: Sister Ray will have it.
Came out of Sister Ray with another 5 CDs. One of them was Darker Days Ahead! But I'd failed to stop myself buying a load more stuff too, and Geoff had finally succumbed and came out with a bunch of music too. Heh. A not-so-quick stop at Subway followed during which a hip-hop band of some description turned up, talking about music, racism, and then filming some freestyling (I think) for some DVD or other outside. English lads, and I've no idea who they were. Interesting though. After finishing our feet we headed to the Tattershall Castle, for drinks to celebrate 3 people's birthdays. Massive turnout, I think at one point there might have been more than 20 of us! We certainly took over 4 tables and had people standing too.
I learnt yesterday courtesy of Mark that the Intrepid Fox is shutting and turning into flats. WTF! Geoff wants to come back to London to drink in it next week. I want to resist :-( today is going to be another large day, with Nige on his way down as I type, and I had in my mind a vague plan to avoid alcohol from tomorrow until I jet off on Friday. We'll see how well this plan goes, eh.
After buying those we went for a pint in the middle of Soho (having been propositioned by 2 whores on the way) and actually had 3. This solved the really bad hangover I was having that the aircon in Virgin had made worse. The hangover was caused by Thursday having been my last day at work until November, a fact I felt necessary to celebrate by having way too much to drink. Ahem. Never going to "Plyr" again though, what a horrifying place...
Anyway, yesterday, after those pints I dragged Geoff deeper into Soho 'cos I still wanted the Terrorizer album. Went in Mister CD and came out with 2 purchases, neither of them by Terrorier. OK, this is it, last stop I promise: Sister Ray will have it.
Came out of Sister Ray with another 5 CDs. One of them was Darker Days Ahead! But I'd failed to stop myself buying a load more stuff too, and Geoff had finally succumbed and came out with a bunch of music too. Heh. A not-so-quick stop at Subway followed during which a hip-hop band of some description turned up, talking about music, racism, and then filming some freestyling (I think) for some DVD or other outside. English lads, and I've no idea who they were. Interesting though. After finishing our feet we headed to the Tattershall Castle, for drinks to celebrate 3 people's birthdays. Massive turnout, I think at one point there might have been more than 20 of us! We certainly took over 4 tables and had people standing too.
I learnt yesterday courtesy of Mark that the Intrepid Fox is shutting and turning into flats. WTF! Geoff wants to come back to London to drink in it next week. I want to resist :-( today is going to be another large day, with Nige on his way down as I type, and I had in my mind a vague plan to avoid alcohol from tomorrow until I jet off on Friday. We'll see how well this plan goes, eh.
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