Here I am in Shepherd's Bush. Looking sad. (CUT TO ARM MOVEMENT)
Turquoise has been replaced by grey. I am not even sure the holiday or my island paradise even really existed.
It turned out to be a pretty eventful last day. It was a wrench to leave behind our room (as well as to prevent myself from ringing next door's bell), but we were on the speed boat at 10am and back at the airport by 11. There was some seemingly bad news waiting for us on arrival though. Our 1.45pm flight had been delayed until after four. We could have stayed on the island for two more hours! It seemed we would have a lot of time to kill in the tiny Male airport (the capital city of the Maldives is called Male - it is not a sexed aerodrome), but the holiday rep suggested we might like to take a tour of the city to kill some time. After so much lounging around it felt like a positive move to go and do some sight-seeing and I realised that all the delay meant was that we were getting some extra holiday. So where's the downside of that?
A cheerful student took us and another couple on a ferry across the water and showed us round the smallest capital city in the world. It was pretty hot and I had been wearing my suit as I was preparing for English weather (though I rolled up my jacket and put it in my bag) and was sweating heavily. It was strange to be amongst people and traffic again and we had to keep an eye out for the motorbikes that rocket around the narrow streets. It's not a city packed with spectacle - most tourists are coming to the Maldives for the beaches and the diving, but we saw the Presidential residence and a 350 year old mosque and graveyeard and some markets. It's a Muslim country and one that perhaps shows the stereotype that has been built up around this religion is not very representative. There's no drinking of course and little crime and the people were friendly and welcoming (which would make sense as tourism is 50% of their industry, but I don't think that's why they're like that). Compared to the impoliteness and drunkenness and unpleasantness of the capital city that I live in, this was revelatory. Even the sea water by the city and the airport was still turquoise.
Of course western influences pervade a little - I saw a Hannah Montana ball for sale in one shop window - but there was a calmness and contentment amongst the bustling city. No noticeable flotsam and jetsam of society - no booze means no alcoholic homeless people - when people got in each other's way they apologised or smiled. Our guide told us that in the Maldives it was legal to have up to four wives. I think I might come and live here. But still have no wives. As I have for the last 43.5 years.
It was a stroke of luck to get this extra time to see this, not that I was thinking that later when I was on the plane (can you believe I almost forgot to do my cut to? I only remembered right near the end of the flight). I had been up since 6am and the plane was not going to get in until 10.30pm London time (3.30am on the clock I had been operating with for the last fortnight). In the end I was awake for 23 hours today and still got into bed at midnight.
I didn't really want to sleep on the plane, but wouldn't have been able to anyway, because almost every possible distraction had been arranged for me. Perhaps my neighbours back on the island had sorted it out for me so that the fun could continue. Of course the woman in front put back her chair and left me crammed in a tiny space and of course the man behind kept kicking my seat and used my headrest to haul himself up whenever he got up. These things are expected. As was the usual persistent secret farter (and for once it wasn't me - my stomach troubles clearing up just in time for the flight!) letting out silent and violent lingering emissions. It struck me as odd that in a world that has ear plugs to block out sound and eye masks to block out light, no one has yet come up with some kind of nasal plug or filter system to protect us from these unpleasant odours in confined spaces. That would surely be a massive seller and shouldn't be too hard to invent. I mean everyone could wear a gas mask, but that would be restrictive. Some discreet thing to plug up the nostrils. Come on scientists, pull your fingers out of your noses and put them... back up your noses.
There was a man with a terrible cold diagonally behind me to my left. He was sniffing noisily ever 30 seconds and though he had a handkerchief used it only to spit into. Not only was there the fear of catching his disease (and not to give Al Qaeda even more ideas - I know they got the pants and bra idea from me - but rather than planting bombs, why not put a terrorist with a slow acting contagious disease on a plane - they will get through all checks, infect all the other passengers, who will then arrive home and give the disease to all the Western dogs), but the noise was awful, though luckily could be drowned out by my noise-cancelling headphones. The same can not be said unfortunately of the woman, three rows in front of me, who was talking in such a loud voice that I could hear almost everything she was saying even when listening to loud music. The drone of her voice was incessant. She was scarcely pausing for breath. I tried to ignore her or hope she would stop, but after two hours my girlfriend commented on it too. I was not entirely sure of her situation - she seemed to be with a boyfriend, though I think there is a chance that this was just a man she was sitting next to and they had made two other new friends. My girlfriend heard her say, "None of us know each other, so let's spend the flight finding everything out! It'll pass the time."
But it was mainly her expressing herself and one had to wonder if it was necessary for her to talk in a voice loud enough for a man three rows back, wearing noise-cancelling headphones to hear. I am sure she was annoying more people than me and my girlfriend, but there was no Tubeman aboard and everyone was too polite to say anything.
Things took a bit of a turn for the worse when they started playing a drinking game and constantly pressing the button for the attendant to bring them more wine. I realised that the girl (I say girl and had assumed she was a student on her gap year, which would explain her desire to befriend strangers and talk in a voice that could penetrate a nuclear bunker, but when I saw her later she looked about 35) had probably been drunk from the start, but now she was getting worse. She started asking everyone who passed to take a photo of her and her new friends, including hilariously, my girlfriend who wanted to throttle this inconsiderate idiot, but was too polite to refuse. They must have got a dozen photos of the four of them sitting on a plane, which is all very well and good, but I would suggest slight overkill. I really thought about going up to them and asking politely if they might just talk a little bit quieter, but I think we were all aware that with drink in the equation and three men all enjoying the attention of a drunk woman that that might create problems. We were stuck in a fart filled metal tube with these people and anything could happen. So we tried to mind our own business.
Luckily the men seemed to get tired after four hours when the attendants finally refused them more booze (and it was surprising that they had let it go on for so long, but they were lovely and charming and politely did their job and took photos and returned every five minutes when the light came on) and seemed to return to their seats. There was a little bit of peace. That woman could really talk. About nothing. For a long time. I got engrossed in the films and missed the details, but I think she was probably sick shortly afterwards as the attendants had to spray around her seat and there was still a distinct whiff of puke amongst the stale farts. Then later still an announcement came over the tannoy for anyone with medical expertise to come forwards and we saw that someone (it turned out to be our friend) was lain out at the back of the plane. There was some justice to all of this and an air of bleak satisfaction to the people who had endured the drama so far. It was possibly the inevitable conclusion, but might be trumped by the fact that she might get seriously ill or die and we'd have to stop off at an airport on the way for her to get medical treatment. She was at least quiet now and contrite and in pain and she did recover thanks to the assistance of a very patient and pleasant doctor. There were some tears later on and a harsh word from one of the fellow passengers who commented correctly that the girl had in some ways brought this on herself. It was like a parable for our modern times. Her new friends and I think even her "boyfriend" had deserted her. Perhaps realising that she was a self-indulgent handful.
The only thing that was really lacking was a screaming baby. There were a couple of toddlers a couple of rows behind, but in spite of everything they behaved impeccably and I didn't even hear them make a noise. It's saying something when a one year old is better behaved than you are.
It was a difficult flight. We were all very tired and all a bit later than we had thought we would be and it became easier to understand why from a Muslim perspective the Western world is a quagmire of depravity. If there had been a terrorist virus spreader on board I would at least have taken some comfort in the fact that that loquacious woman would have died. The loss of the other 400 passengers would have been justified.
But anyway, we got home eventually, fully prepared to the rudeness of London life. I know I have sounded like a middle-aged man complaining about impoliteness for the last few days, and in many ways that is what I am, but it has been at a staggering level. I will try to write of other things, if you, the people of the world, will attempt to stop being such selfish cunts.
