Wonderland in UK

“Wow, Papa, look at the parking lot!” This was Maxim walking out of the airport hotel on Saturday morning at 6:00 a.m. after 4 hours of sleep. Not to be outdone in the aura of wide-eyed fascination, Oskar looked around with a smile that split his face like a ripe watermelon falling off a truck—pure happiness. Nothing puts an experience in a better light than a child with no inhibitions who has it in his mind that things are cool.

The whole weekend was a trip through wonderland—and the kids had fun, too.
We began with a four-hour flight from Tirana to London; Oskar had a new coloring book, Maxim, a new joke book. I found three empty seats calling to me. I envy Maura’s ability to sleep at a 5% incline anytime she wants.

6:15 am Saturday, Oct. 15 A Family Rail Pass. This pass would get us greatly reduced fares. Even discounted, however, they were still only marginally less than outrageously expensive. Maura had tried for several nights in a row to buy the thing online, using her substantial online experience, without success. All she managed to obtain was an application form for the Family Rail Pass. Show up at the train station Saturday morning and hope there are windows open so we can buy the stuff we need.

Thinking that people at the ticket window are all for efficiency, I stepped up and, without even saying hello, “We need to buy a family pass.” A woman at the neighboring window called me over. I slid our application through the tiny slit in the glass. When she internalized what we wanted, and our pathetic unpreparedness, she chuffed, “Let’s get you the proper form, shall we?” She made motions for us to see her colleague and sent us back to the same line she called us out of 2 minutes earlier.

This man was…well…chubby, sitting like a lump of marshmallow, eating Cadbury’s chocolates.

“Where are we going today?” says the marshmallow. As I said, we knew exactly what we wanted and I wasn’t in the mood to futz around.

“Well, we are going to Newcastle, but right now we need to get to King’s Cross to meet a friend who has our tickets. We need a Family Rail Pass.”

“So, you want to buy the tickets straight through to Newcastle”

“No, we need to buy tickets to King’s Cross.”

“Well, see if you buy the tickets to Newcastle, the whole trip would be discounted.”

“But we already have tickets to Newcastle. We are meeting a friend at King’s Cross. He has our tickets.”

“So you already have the tickets to Newcastle?”

“Yes.”

Maura was kicking me in the back of the knees now, adding to my budding annoyance. The thing is that the groom (we were on our way to a wedding) bought the tickets, pretending to be in possession of a Family Rail Pass, pretending to need train tickets from London to Newcastle on the October 16, and pretending to be us. Then, without touching the tickets, Groom had them mailed to his male friend (also pretending to be us), named Gwyn in London. Then, minutes before the train would depart, we were going to quietly bump into the Gwyn on platform 4 and make the exchange. In this new world of triple checks on passports, removing our shoes for ex-ray at the check-in line, and other hypersensitive security, we were not sure if this bit of skullduggery was allowed.

“Oh, well, that’s a pity,” said Mr. Lump.

“Well, yes, it’s a pity, but that’s what it is, so let’s get on with it!” I was losing patience. After all, we didn’t know how long it would take to get from Gatwick to King’s Cross so we didn’t want to dawdle. The man on the other side of the window did not seem to have any fire in his rump. His words came slowly, like sludge flowing through a hole the size of a pin … the last drops of shampoo eeking out of a bottle on a cold morning…a rattlesnake sloughing its used scales.

Meanwhile, Maura is throwing daggers at me with her eyes now, because we actually DID get the discount Mr. Marshmallow was talking about. She didn’t want me to let the cat out of the bag. In actual fact, I didn’t understand exactly what it was Groom had done for us, so I could very easily have spilled the beans all over the station and put us into a fantastically over-priced rental car and used the already purchased tickets for our next campfire. My whole life seems to be a series of incidents of talking too much.

Annoyingly, the man seemed to take no notice of my rudeness. A let down. After all, why would I express my frustration if I didn’t want my distaste to register?

Luckily, right about then, before I could open my mouth too wide, I noticed a pastry shop just a few meters away. I took the boys as Maura took over dealings with the marshmallow. About 10 minutes later, I walked back to the window and Maura was just leaving. “How’d it go?”

“That ridiculous man! Just sell me what I need!”

“Did you get what we need?”

“Yes, I got exactly what I need, but I could have been out of there 10 minutes ago!”

“Did you get the tickets BACK from Newcastle?”

“No, I just wanted to get to King’s Cross. If I’d have bought the return from Newcastle…that man! ‘Weeeeelll, what class of ticket would you like?’ ‘Where do you want to sit?’ I can only imagine. I would’ve been there for another hour.”

High on the list of great things in young boys’ lives are trains. They love the freedom to walk around while we are moving at 90 miles an hour. They love the huge windows that allow them to see the countryside flying by in truly living color. They love to feel like they are riding Thomas the train engine. They love their coloring books and Playmobile magazines. So…the three and half hour train ride from London to Newcastle was one thrill after another.

Another nugget of British life the boys were eager to see was the cool taxis. These were the boxes with ceilings traditionally high enough to accommodate men’s top hats when they were in fashion. Their back does open in the reverse manner for easy access. Even during the brief walk between the hotel and the tube station, they shouted out, “Hey! There’s a funky London taxi!” So of course when we left the station, Maxim nearly jumped in front of the first car he saw. We told the young man our hotel as he put our bag in the back—he paused. “Well, it’s right there, you might want to walk.” Maura had done well with the reservations. The place was across the street from the reception—a science museum, no less…featuring a Dr. Who exhibit. The fun was just beginning.

Barry told a story about an American guy who was on a hike with them in baku. They had arrived at a stop area after they had just been climbing for 4 hours. They pooled all their fook—one person had a Mars bar, another a bit of bread and chaeese, someone else an apple. The this guy pulls out this assive watermelon that he had carried all the way in his backpack. The geat part about this story was the uniquely andintriguing way that Barry told the story. For one thing, he is from Iraland, so he has at least a bit of an Irish accent (he’s lived in the UK and traveld around for years.) but he alsotalks simply. Not him, ot any of us really, told storied giving the imprssioin that we were trying tohive some kind of show. We weren’t trying to be the enter of the evening. I had the attention on me several ties. One tie inparticular when the food was coming out. They would ask, are you a vegetarian? I would say yes, even though I’m not a strict vegetarian—but that night, I didn’t want to eat a slab of flesh. The first time, I had the soup in fron to me ready to dig in when it wa s whisked away after I admitted that I was trying to eat vegetarian that evening. my vegetarian status. The next conversationtn they put plates down in front of everyone EXCEPT the veggies. I remarked how it was exactly the opposite on the plane—when you have some kind of special request—vegetarian, gruit meal, low-cargo, hilal, couture, etc.—your are seved FIRST. They want to het the whinders with their special requests out of the way.

Best part of this weekend was the chance to meet up with people who we had know in Baku.

I talked about my experience in a pork slaughtering hose. Don’t eat much meat for health reason. Not because of my experience in the packing plant and my revulsion to ward the treatment of animals. Exploring my experiences—said that I worked in the “Chits” deparment. Barry asked if I was dealing with the accounting area—chits that detail how uch money goea inand out, etc. I gave soe details how the intestines and stomack would come to me on down a shoot in the form of a small 35° ramp. I would use a mounted razor blade to cut off the stomach and throw it one way. Then I would cut off the asshole and throw it with the other intestines.

One young woman at our table, a true vegetarian was ever so slightly taken aback by my description which I immediately cut short at that point. I was truly aware that I may have been saying some interesting things.

The bar man at the reception area before the reception sold us some beers. We got to talking. When I told him I was from Iowa, he said, “Oh. There’s a lot of Dutch there, yeah?” I thought ot so many because I figured theyre were many in Minnesota. He says, “Well, whne I watch the Hawkeyes, it seems there are a lot of vans.” I thought he had said a colossally strange 2^nd language non-sequitar didn’t have any idea what he was talking about but I wanted to keep the conversation going so I smiled and nodded. Then he said, “You know, Van Werkoven and Van Deweile.”

“Oh, yes,” I said, the lights coming clear. I didn’t really know there were so many but I played along. Then I asked why he watched the Howkeyes.

“That’s why I’m here you know. I came over from Holland 20 years ago to play semi-professional American football.” Now, he coaches American football. A couple of the young men he brought over fro the etherlands are now playing for Boise State. (Speaking of Boise State, one of the new teachers here this year is from Boise State; while we traded some stories about football, she told be about the 2007 Fiesta Bowl between B. State and Oklahoma. The ending was fantastic with trick plays and last second scores. Her words inspired me to look it up and enjoy clips on youtube. And the fact that they were an underdog beating Oklahoma, a school that perennially beats the crap out of Iowa State made it all the more exciting.)

I asked what position he played—I wantd him to know that I was truly interewsed in his story and that I knew something about the game. He played defensive back—I said, “Oh, so you must have been pretty quic and speedy.”

“I was at one time. Now you can see that I carry acouple footballs around my waist all the time now.”

“What position do you think I played in high school?”

“You must have been a receiver or something.”

When I told him I played guard and linebaker, we laughed like they day was full of pickles. “That must have been a mighty small school”

The dancing was amixture of square dancing, Azeri dancing, an disco and 80’s—no one was left out. The goom played a video tape of himself at his first Azeri wedding 15 years ago. Dancng shaking his bottom and expressing entirely toomuch movement.

Maxim met up with Thomas—a young boy of 8 years, 8 months. The son of Bary and Sarah. We carry around apicture of Maxim and Thomas, at 2 years old, standing naked in a baby pol with Barry and I (fully clothed). Thomas an dMaxim and Oskar got along famously as they were wrestling around kicking each other playfully in the fead, etc.

Seeral times, I picked up the boys, aried them on my shoulder or they road me lke an elephant and we also did carwheels an dhad stands.

Both Friday AND Saturday nights, we didn’t get to bed until midnight.

Barry said at one point that it was great to see the boys both reading or drawing. He said his son, Thomas, would never calm down and do that. Maura an I took great pains to read to Masim all the tie and foster a love of books. Oskar, so far, of course he doesn’t read yet, but he loves to color and draw pictures, which are activities that Maxim never cottoned onto much.

More directions—“Is Trafalger Square straight ahead?” It was 10:00 on a Monday nght and a woman had just walked out of an office. She had afurry hat and sensible shos, and a scarf. She carried her bags tightly. I was wearing a rainbow tie-die and black shorts. A bit “interesting”considering the chill in the air.

“Oh! What?” she was at least startled, but her basic friendliness was not overcoe. “O, yes, just up there, I’d say it was straight, but I would won’t to mislead you.”

I made asnaky gesture with y arm aas I said, “So I shouldjust squirrel my way through there? Thanks. And I’m…please pardon me for startelign yo.”

“Oh, no, that’s OK. Better it be a runner than…someone else.”

“I have no idea, mate. We’re new here, too.”

One of the 16 black guys in London, a city of 11 million—who was not said, “You’re looking for Charing Cross road? Well it’s just thought there. If yo continue down here, you’ll run into it.”

Moswt of my requests for directions where ostly unnescessary. I had a couple maps and a London book. Only one time was I completely flummoxed. I stapped into a betting parlor, I think, and asked the double-thick security guard if Charing Cross Road was right outside the door.

“Yeah, mate, goes right out there.”

“And Trafalger Square—if I carry on this way, right along—“

“THAT way,” he answered, gesturing in the opposite direction.

“Ah, yes, okay, thanks.” Luckily, I had known enough about my unsureedness that I had only just begun that leg of my trip.”

“Are you from London?”

“No, I’m not, mate.”

“Oh, OK,” and I turned to go. I didn’t want to bother this person who was probably atourist like me. One thing about London is that her number of languages one might hear on the street is incredible. It’s like a real Babble out there—many languages I couldn’t even recognize.

“What are you looking for?”

“You wouldn’t know where the Globe is would you? Is it right down along the river here?”

“Yes, yes. It’s about a 15-minute walk.”

Turned out to be a 25-minute walk as I learned form Maura the next day because of a diversion in the path because of construction.

Saw the ‘heat-camera’ in Newcastle. Tain backreading kids bookwhile Oska falls asleep. Hotel-no complimentary shaver razor. Kits of stiff are “for sale” at reception. Nowon at reception desk. A bunch of machines that nread credit cards. No adapeter for electricalplug; messagegd call a number, to call assistance, another number.

Ray, saw people sleeping in door ways. Asking directioins, no idea, ignore, stop me after overhearing and offer help. Boodstore freedom, Two MEN stop me to give directions.

Outdoor street performers, “crazy man.” Asking for tips 20, 10, 5, 2 or if you are American, 50—that’s about $2.

Bought the water-proofing beeswax. Rode the d-d bus two times Backon sameone same driver-different trip so you have to pay again.

Zane Efron, movie premier poparazi American woman out front. This is Efron’s estranged shild. Flach bulbs Restaurant catering to kids. Drawings mags.