Farewell Dubai

Finally, what all of us hot-blooded males had been waiting for; the belly-dancer. Couldn’t see a bloody thing!

Do you know, though, I believe we have more than five senses. One such sense that is off the scale is imagination. Jane gave me a vivid description of what was going on. The woman had, apparently, all the correct lumps and bumps that wiggled and jiggled in time with the music. My mind filled in the gaps.

When we were nearly halfway through she added another description that changed the entire image dancing in my head. I often get this when I am listening to football commentary. All of a sudden the commentator will say a certain team is kicking from left to right or playing in orange when, in my head, I had them attacking from right to left and playing in their usual blue and white. The entire picture has changed in a couple of instants. It was the same with the belly dancer. I am not really sure whose belly and face I had conjured up in my head, but when she added that the girl reminded her of a certain acquaintance the entire imaginary vista changed in my head. To be fair it was none the worse for it. No, I’m not going to tell you. Sorry!

That was pretty much the end of our wonderful trip around Asia and, on the whole, we had had a terrific time. Can’t wait to go back, later this month, varying the destinations and hotels ever so slightly. We have made memories that will stay with us until our dying days or, at least, I hope so.

Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten, the greeting we received at Heathrow from the grumpiest border control officer we encountered anywhere during our four weeks away. What is it with you idiots, you are the first English face that visitors to our country, or, for that matter, returning tourists, see.

We were in the line just behind a poor lady, whose command of English was not the greatest, but she did her best. She stepped forward when her turn came. First of all she was informed in such a brash manner that she should have her documentation ready for inspection. She was struggling with two young children, and this berk pointed out that there were signs telling her what she should have done. He, the officer, did not get up every day to deal with people like the woman who could not be bothered to be ready when she stepped forward to enter our country. It was rudeness personified. Despite our lack of understanding of foreign tongues we never received anything other than courteous greetings from the officers of whichever country we entered. Eventually, I am sure chastened by the experience, the woman was allowed to proceed through.

As she moved away we stepped forward. Apparently, Jane told me later, he put his hand up to stop us, we were, obviously, too well prepared and too eager not to get a tongue lashing. My white cane was strategically positioned, diagonally across the front of my body, and he never thought to give me a verbal instruction. Maybe he had run out of words with the previous customer, because that is what we are, customers, that is the people who pay your wages you cretin. Jane tugged me back.

“Just stay calm,” she said, whilst at the same time informing me that there are signs up all over the place instructing us to treat the staff with respect.

“Obviously a one-way street then!” I whispered in response. I don’t think that this jerk would even know the meaning of the word. Airports are stressful enough without this sort of behaviour from the staff.

She handed the passports over. Jerk made such a show of closely inspecting them. He looked us up and down before studying the tiny little booklet again. He seemed genuinely surprised that passengers had disembarked from an aircraft and wanted to enter the country through his booth. I wondered if he was still going through training and hadn’t quite reached the smile and be courteous bit.

Then, he asked me to look at him.

I responded that I was. I explained that I could only see out of the corner of my eyes and that the left one was better than the right.

He slapped the passports down onto his little kiosk desk. “I need to see the front of your face not your ear.”

A tetchy cretin to boot. I tried to look in the direction that I thought his voice had come from.

After a great deal of tutting and other stone-age grunts we were allowed through.

I was willing to forgive the officer on the way out but not this particular jerk. I said, just loud enough for him to hear, I could sense him flinch, that I was going to complain to the Heathrow authorities. Of course, I didn’t. I often promise to complain about many things but, as is usually the case, I get back into the comfort of my own home and forget about it.

Next time, I shall start digging deep into my travel journal and come up with destinations from the past. I am minded to start with Adelaide in Australia, as it nearly put me off ever getting on a plane again.

Anglian Water... a moan!

Following on from the above, I did feel the need to make a complaint earlier this week. I think you would have done too! Take yourself back to Christmas Eve last year, seems like it was nearly a lifetime ago now, doesn’t it, but by the time you read this, it will only be 340 sleeps until the next one.

One of Anglian Water’s underground mains sprang a leak, leaving water gushing out of the ground, onto the road before flowing into our street. All of this precious commodity, there could be wars about it in the future, followed the easiest path to the nearest surface water drain. I can’t bear to think how many gigalitres sluiced down the pan. On its own it wasn’t too much of a problem, although I couldn’t sleep very well at night thinking how the loss might affect Anglian’s executives’ bonuses and its shareholders’ dividends. I am not sure I could live with myself for not doing something to stop these poor people’s misery, you never know, they might have to take one of their children out of private school! Then, it was compounded by the cold snap. The water, I am sure taking Anglian Water by surprise, froze, and turned into something akin to a skating rink along the road. I would have hated to have lived down the road where this life-giving liquid was going down the drain, at night time it must have sounded like Niagara Falls when trying to get to sleep!

Anyway, its social media team posted up a really timely message, which reminded all their customers that eight people every day are diagnosed with some sort of sight loss, and that it was its mission to do all they could to help blind people deal with their newly changed circumstances. They could do anything including reading meters, providing bills in braille or audio, whatever was needed. The list was not exclusive.

I knew many people had complained already but this, I thought, was time to ram their own words firmly down their corporate gullet! I didn’t need a second invitation. I commented on their missive, by saying that they could get the leak plugged that was ruining the lives of local residents, not taking nearly three weeks before repairing it. The freezing conditions had made the footpaths treacherous, and given it was the main approach to the doctors’ surgery from the village, it was dangerous to folk who might not be the steadiest on their feet. I did emphasise that as a blind person I was terrified of going out on my own, for fear of slipping and breaking my back, or something more important.

I received an apologetic note back asking me to DM them and let them have all the details, implying that they wanted this to be brushed under the carpet, or down the drain! This is my interpretation of their note!

I responded by saying that there was no need for secrecy and providing the requested information.

I was informed that the work was scheduled for the next day. Miraculously, though, they came out within two hours and stopped the waste of valued drinking water. Funny what can be done when the mind is concentrated! Now, I am not saying that my banging of this particular drum was what made them come out, after all, it had been well thumped by many others prior to my intervention, but it might just have been my straw that broke the camel’s back to resistance. Who knows? I am sure Anglian Water will claim that they were always going to come out when they did.

At the time of writing it seems like the site has been abandoned. Water leak stemmed, road surface still to be repaired, and signage blocking the pavements. I now wonder how long this will remain the case. And, to think, they have recently had the audacity of announcing inflation busting price hikes. Love every drop! Really?

A Frozen Sandringham Parkrun...

Have you ever kicked a frozen molehill? Nor had I until Parkrun last weekend. I would never recommend it, it is like trying to volley a cannonball into a goal!

I was back at Sandringham for a trot through the woods. My usual VI Guide was not available this time, so the intrepid Sarah Byatt stepped into the breach and agreed to take me round. Sarah is incredibly important in the running of Sandringham Parkrun, taking on the role of Joint Event Director as well as regularly operating as the weekly Run Director; as far as I am aware, she is the one who liaises with all the volunteers to ensure the event takes place every week.

There are one or two thousand Sarahs up and down the country who make sure everything is in position for us runners to come along and enjoy ourselves. I think she was a little more nervous than I, maybe I was showing too much faith? It all worked out well, though, and we completed the course in one piece, until I, rather stupidly, kicked the molehill, or to be honest, walked into it.

Sarah had other duties to perform as well including videoing the start, which meant we were never going to be on for PB times. It didn’t matter, though, we had a great time chatting all the way round. It is interesting, I have now had three different women and three men; it has to be said, and this is merely an observation and not a gender generalisation, but you never run out of things to talk about when tethered to a woman.