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| Saturday April 12th 2003 |
| So
later this year I'll be back in the land of rail strikes, foul weather and
where shop assistants and waiters treat customers as an annoying
inconvenience. Yes folks, I'm heading back to Britain for the family tour later this year, an obligation I have neglected for over a year and so must make up for in a big way. Of course, it will be great to see family and friends, but it will not be what I call a holiday. There will be no poolside service, no sunset strolls on the beach, no five-star breakfast buffets, no pretty girls to ogle on the bus, and on it goes. It will be a couple of weeks of bunking down in various people's spare rooms, of imparting the same tired news several times over as we (yup, the girlfriend is coming too!) hop from relative to relative and doubtless an endless round of liquid gatherings, as friends help me wreck all the good work I have done in terms of healthier living. Don't get me wrong, I shall enjoy every minute in terms of the time we will get to spend with people that I miss, but stopping in other people's homes, disrupting their routine, particularly if they are still working and elbowing past each other for the bathroom, is not what it used to be in visits gone by. It used to be that it was just a case of pitching up at a mate's place at a few days notice, dropping a single bag of carry-on luggage on the spare bed and heading straight out for a reunion celebration at one of the old local haunts. Whatever happened to them, eh? More importantly what ever happened to the people that used to go to them! Now, all these years later, it's a cup of tea accompanied by a chat that includes a mutual health update, favourite pub landlords that have retired and the stomping ground now belonging to a new generation, who don't always welcome the intrusion of what to them is very much the older set... Visits to the older relatives are a delight, but tainted by the knowledge that each visit may be the last time we meet and I always come away a bit depressed with the feeling that I could have said more, and maybe should have done more in the past. This time the rail strikes will make criss-crossing the country a nightmare, so it may mean hiring car, though I don't relish the stress of taking to the road in a country I am not used to driving in. Well, how about the National buses then. Just a thought! There is likely to be at least one hotel stop and several bed & breakfast stops and believe me, standards in the UK are nowhere near what you can expect here in Thailand, or anywhere in Asia for that matter. But for all my moaning I am looking forward to familiar faces and places and even the rain won't seem so bad amidst the lush greenery we are missing here. No-one will understand how I relish the smell of sausage rolls, or why I feel the urge to drive around for hours on my own around the lonely roads of the Isle of Wight. They'll think I'm strange for stopping by Ladbrokes to place 50p on a rank outsider, and they'll be beside them selves when I insist on walking around Woolworths just for the nostalgic hell of it! 'Uncle Stogie... When's he coming back then eh, dad?' 'Oh, about another year or so... next time maybe for not as long though, eh kids?' |
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