Hallow Jack

It’s not that I haven’t been sleeping well, I have. But there has been an ‘air’ that has kept me if not on edge then a little sharp.

Then of course the penny dropped. Over the years I have done many things but probably at heart I am an Event Manager. For those of you who are Event Managers, know an Event Manager or lives with an Event Manager will know that as a breed we are compelled to behave in a certain way. To tidy the untidy, to plan incessantly, to constantly think about ‘what next’. There must be something a little odd about people who arrive at a restaurant, bar, cinema or an amazing vantage point with stunning views over the sea, water or mountains and whose first instinct is to think about…. what happens next? how will we leave? by what means? where do we need to get to, by when? Yes that is an event manager.

So when that most precious of all things, one of our children decides to embark on a trip that involves four times zones, eight flights, two ferries, two separate drives of a best part of a 1,000 miles and a raft of airport to town and town to airport transfers and doing all of this +4, +10, +10.5 and +11 hours from the UK…. no wonder I have felt a little wired….the desire to dabble is almost irresistible….ok I will fess up… delete the word ‘almost’.

Oh well….

Watching Hellen on her travels brings back memories….

You could say a sense of deja vu…..

My trip was March 2010, Hellen’s a few days ago.

She is now going to places far beyond I got to in Australia. I am however looking forward to meeting her in Sydney airport next month for our joint adventure to New Zealand…maybe not infinity…. but certainly beyond (Australia)

Tonight I am in the German city of Dusseldorf. This is my 3rd visit probably in as many months.  I quite like the vibe of the city, there is a pleasant mixture of old and new buildings and a real sense of its inhabitants wanting to have some fun and enjoy life.

My first visit was in the summer, the days long and warm. Natives of the city enjoying socialising outside in pavement cafes and bars. My last visit was in September, this year a warm and dry month,  and again people were on the streets, drinking, chatting and laughing with each other – enjoying the good fortune of being able to be outside at the start of Autumn.

Now this Monday evening darkness has raced upon us against the clock with which we measure time and the wind delivers a bite there are a lot less people brave enough to embrace the terraces of quiet restaurants. But some there are, wrapped up with woollen hats and scarves, determined to squeeze to the very last every vestige of opportunity not to retreat into the burrows of buildings and winter’s hibernation.

I am sat in a hotel bar, the music is pacy and whilst not loud enough to prevent a conversation is far from soothing for this time of the evening. The back wall of the long bar illuminates the many sentries of bottles.

Lights elsewhere in the bar are low, creating washes of colour across the tables. This is a place for winter. The outside world of no consequence to the huddles of people drinking brandies and whiskies to warm them through.

Next month I will return. The days will fade oh so quickly, and the people will have fully retreated into a world of artificial light and warmth. The place will be the same but very much in a different time….

Without doubt Vancouver is a city set in a stunning location, encircled by what are currently green covered mountains and water. The regular hum of floatplanes going about their daily business and a people who are secure in who they are and carry themselves in quite, non aggressive confidence that they know they live in one of the most beautiful cities in the world.

Today the sun has lit up the North Shore, fluffy white clouds are drifting across of the mountains opposite, only the workman like passage of floatplanes are disturbing the water.

Fresh coffee, excellent pastries….. homemade mango jam…. this is the way to start the day.

By my calculation I have been awake around twenty two and half hours, but I still need to stay awake. It is nearly 10pm local. Local being Vancouver time and I have flown in from London, England.

Writing this is a part of the strategy to remain awake, sat in the lobby bar of the Fairmont Pacific Rim hotel, with a beer, a note book and my laptop.  The flight over consisted of two movies, a read of the Sunday Times and over the nine hours of the flight 4 small bottles of wine and a G&T. There was also a small doze somewhere Greenland and one of Canada’s northern islands. A doze not a sleep so I maintain the twenty two and half hours claim for wakefulness.

The general rule I follow when travelling across time zones is always, always go to local time. So I need to stay awake, otherwise I will be up even earlier tomorrow than I am already going to be.

There is nothing worse than waking up at stupid o’clock in the morning and not being able to go back to sleep. All you do is end up waiting. Waiting until it is respectable, or near respectable to be around the public areas of the hotel, for the cleaners to have finished their work and for the overnight staff to be thinking of going home.

A few years ago in New Orleans, pre Katrina, I was up early and went for a walk down to the Mississippi and found what turned out to be a reasonably famous cafe for a coffee and cake and some very early hour. I remember rising sun breathing warmth in the day and people enjoying the freshness of the morning before the stickiness of the Louisiana summer started to bite.

My stand out memory of that morning was the reaction of the cafe customers to a troop of men in fatigues out an early morning run in formation and doing that american thing of singing responses to the sergeants refrain. To a man, and women, the coffee drinking cafe customers stood and applauded the men who were serving the flag. They stood again twenty or so minutes later when the men returned.

As a Brit it is a little hard to fathom this overt display of patriotism. It seems too far over the top. The apparent sincerity of their display confusing. If a bunch of Brits stood up and applauded soldiers running past the first instinct would be that they were taking the Michael. I guess that display that morning was a good example that despite sharing our language Americans are indeed foreign.

It was an interesting morning, that day in New Orleans alongside the Mississippi.

The time is now 10.35pm, I no long need to stay awake. I can finish my beer, sign my check, publish this drivel and take myself off to hopefully a long a peaceful sleep.

Bye bye for now.

🙂