Top
For Eddie and Jean Stafford of Rochdale, Lancs.
With affection and gratitude
I visited Great Britain from November 1998 to January 1999, and met my husband's only brother Eddie and his wife Jean for the first time. On our last night with Eddie and Jean, I scribbled a farewell ode to thank them for their kindess and boundless hospitality. After I returned home, I wrote down in verse a few more of my most vivid memories and impressions of our trip.
Travelling overseas was something that I never believed would happen for me. Nevertheless, circumstances provided the opportunity and, thank goodness, Tony and I both thought "if not now, then when?" Paradoxically, taking what seemed to me at the time to be the biggest step ever was as easy as going home, but yet as exciting and challenging as anything I have ever done.
The memories will last forever. Each time I recognise a scene in a photograph; each time a book mentions a place I remember -- then I get a little thrill and think "I've been there!"
For Tony, it was a chance he thought he might never have again, to reconnect with loved ones both left behind long ago, and as yet unmet.
The very best thing, though, was that Eddie and Jean were there waiting, ready to welcome me and make me feel at home. That I can only be grateful for, as such kindness I could never hope to repay.
The Pomes
You get to the airport 3 hours early, because on your ticket it says to be there at least 2 hours before your flight
and you don’t want to take silly chances and add to the unbearable anxiety you already feel by being late,
AND
you check in straight away and find that some bastard’s already gotten in before you
and snaffled the bulkhead seats with the bit more legroom that the travel agent said you could ask for
if you got there early enough, and
THEN
the person on the check-in desk asks you “aisle or window” and you come over all peculiar trying to decide
IF
you’d rather have a view and somewhere to lean your shoulder into,
but suffer the humiliation of
forcing your big arse past the noses of the people in the other two seats if you want to have a pee,
OR
sit on the aisle where the other two have to shove their bums past you, and
you know you’ll be jostled every time they serve drinks, or meals, or
someone else down the plane needs to go for a widdle,
and
you won’t be able to see a damn thing of the half a world you’re flying over,
and you’re worried that you’ll drool on the shoulder of the person in the next seat if you manage to nod off,
and anyway there’ll be no way to scrunch your pillow up under your shoulder like you do in your own bed at home,
SO
you go for the window seat, knowing you won’t dare take a pee or go for a drink of water or just walk around,
no matter what the “Women’s Weekly” says about surviving jet travel,
but at least you’ll have a dark window to stare at and wonder where you are,
THEN
you kill time (round two hours or so) cruising the duty-free shops with your rellies and friends who have come to see you off
(but not buying anything because you’re going to wait til you get to Singapore where everyone says it’s cheaper and better),
and buying drinks you don’t really want,
AND
all the while your heart is fluttering and your brain is doing its best to impress on the rest of the recalcitrant organism that
this is IT,
this is REAL, better get a grip because you’re finally doing it, right NOW, no joke,
UNTIL
the “Departures” signboard finally clicks up the number of the gate your flight is leaving from,
and now that you’ve got that last bit of essential information you relax and have one last drink, one last smoke,
then suddenly a different board tells you it’s your last call to go through Customs,
SO
you rush through the sentimental bon-voyages you’ve been anticipating for weeks
(quick hugs, a cursory peck, ‘bye, see you, take care)
and before you realise it
everyone you know is on the other side of the barrier and gone,
you’ve had to leave the luggage trolley behind and lug everything yourself, and
you’re in Customs with 300 people in front of you,
AND
half of them seem to be families of Asian tourists, and the rest are Swedish backpackers or Muslim refugees
and it seems like none of them have filled out their departure declarations,
BUT
finally you get through Customs, and spot a luggage trolley in the distance;
summon a last burst of energy and race a Japanese student for it;
pause to cough, wheeze and catch your breath, and just begin to think
about a few duty-free purchases that hadn’t occurred to you until now,
WHEN
the “first boarding call” announcement comes over the tannoy, twenty minutes until departure time,
and the voice tells you there’s a 20 minute walk from the Transit Lounge to your boarding gate,
SO
you push your luggage trolley as fast as your overweight, overwrought self will allow,
thinking all the time about the asthma puffer in your cabin bag and your poor abused feet,
already swollen and sore from those long, long walks from the Lounge to the terminal doors for that one last smoke,
AND
get to your gate, and anyway have to stand in a queue for 20 minutes
until it’s your turn to show your “ticket, passport and boarding pass, please”,
then have to abandon your luggage trolley and struggle with handbags, cabin bags,
boarding passes, tickets and elderly Mother-in-Law down a ramp that seems to go for miles,
UNTIL
you’re on the plane and the Purser smiles and welcomes you aboard,
and tells you you’ve got to lug your bags and M-i-L all the way to the back of the plane
to find seats 41A and B,
AND
you do, then get flustered because you’re blocking the aisle while you struggle to
put cabin bags and coats in the overhead locker; M-i-L in her seat and her seatbelt on;
yourself into the window seat without falling into her lap;
and then to juggle pillows, blankets, earphone sets, seatbelts and handbags into their allotted places,
THEN
finally settle yourself, M-i-L, Nicorettes, sleeping pills, pillow, your paperback blockbuster,
welcoming orange juice, lap tray, blanket, and in-flight magazines;
fasten seat-belt and you’re ready to go, but
NOW,
you notice that the seats in front of and behind you are occupied by Japanese kids with pocket computer games,
whose parents have discreetly opted to be seated well away from their over-indulged and over-excited offspring;
your newly-fitted, refurbished, ergonomically-designed, state-of-the-art seat insists on slowly reclining itself
and cannot stay upright (much like your goodself at this point),
AND
YOU REALISE THE JOURNEY HAS ONLY JUST BEGUN.
back to top
The landing approach – water on the ground everywhere.
an airport like every other airport you’ve been in, but welcoming faces you recognise from photos,
and there are tears because they’re happy to see you.
Clear blue sky and crisp cold thast makes you feel great after
that long stint sealed up in a Jumbo-sized flying Pringles tube
-- and your first cigarette!
Narrow mean streets with row upon row of terraces,sooty red brick and pebbledash,
two up and two down,
not a 3-bedroom highset weatherboard on 40 perches to be seen.
Mock-Tudor semis. Highrise flats.
Cars parked every which-way on streets barely wide enough
for a car, let alone the buses,
but drivers who give way even when the law says they needn’t.
Double yellow lines. Funny-looking taxis. Belisha beacons.
Pubs everywhere – “King’s Arms”, “Weaver’s Arms”, “Dyer’s Arms”,
“Wagon and Horses”, “Regal Moon”
– “Mucky Duck”?
Pints of mild (cellar temperature), Smith’s Smooth, Newky Brown, Labatt’s and Stella Artois.
Abdul’s Food Store on the corner (milk, bread, cigs and halal smallgoods).
Mini-marts and off-licences. The “All-Irish Fish and Chip Shop and Curry Takeaway”;
every second restaurant a Balti house.
Meat and potato pie, pork pies, tea cakes, ready-made Yorkshire pud,
and bread that tastes like bread is supposed to.
Luke and Esther’s tantalising curry wafting up the stairs. Dandelion and burdock. Irn-Bru.
ASDA’s all-day breakfast, and Jean’s incomparable roast dinners.
Central heating, gas fires, and houses warm enough to prove bread dough.
(No wonder there’s a ‘flu epidemic every winter -- doesn’t anyone ever open a window?)
Dicky Step’s Riding Academy; the Marathon Belting Company;
Gracie Fields and Stubley Old Hall; Birch Hill.
Clog makers and parish churches centuries older than Captain Cook. Empty mills.
Snow on the Pennines, Rochdale Canal, the Summit and the old Roman Road;
Blue tits and robins in the garden; seagulls and magpies (are those magpies)?
Real holly with berries, mistletoe and mince pies.
“Emmerdale”, “Heartbeat”, “Coronation Street”, even bloody “Neighbours” on the telly.
Turn off the radiator and throw open the window in “my” room;
let the clean chill air flood in until Eddie and Jean call it the Isolation Ward.
Jean’s exuberant shout, “The sun’s over the yard-arm, where’s my friend Vicki?”,
and Eddie’s quieter “What are you having, flower?”
Click my heels three times, like Dorothy –
Half a world away from Oz and I’m home.
back to top
Do you want to test your marriage:
Check before you post the banns?
U.K. motor touring sorts the
“Stayers” from the “also-rans”.
Roads go one place to another –
That much is self-evident.
Ergo, don’t you name the road by
Where you left, and where you went?
Ipswich folk who drive to Brisbane
Know that Brisbane Road’s the way;
Coming back, what else to follow
But the Ipswich Motorway?
Take a local jaunt in Britain
And it does things to your head.
You will need a calculator,
Just to read the “A to Z”.
M62 from Leeds to Rochdale;
A58 from Syke to Clough;
A681 from Clough to Bacup –
Sod the B-roads, that’s enough!
What about the signs to guide you
On the roads from A to B?
Someone has a sense of humour
At the bloody M. o T.!
Double roundabouts, God bless them --
Guess it’s just the locals’ game;
Great big signs that clearly send you
Hurtling back the way you came.
But, for the determined tourist,
B-roads are a wily trap.
“That’s the most direct road, darling,
See, it says so on the map!”
Down along a one-horse hedgerow,
Trust the signpost, off we go….
Reach a tiny rural crossroad….
“Which way, dammit?” “I don’t know!”
Thank God Britain is so tiny,
For where e’er you go astray,
There’s a pub or an off-licence
Just a mile or so away!
>>GO to more Pomes
back to top