The Grand Tour 2.5 Episode 2 London

Abu Dhabi to London: A coming home?

The original members of TGT1 lived in London for 3 years and the 3rd member of TGT2.5 was born there so in some ways flying into London felt like coming home. In our 3 years there we travelled around Europe a lot and got to know Heathrow fairly well so it was all very familiar. The flight over was surprisingly event free as well. The first time on an A380 was all very modern and the food was good, lovely flight attendants and an astonishingly smooth take off which we could watch from on board cameras either in the nose, underneath or on top of the tail. Fascinating. Fine when we were taking off but unnerving when landing as the tail camera showed how wobbly we were as we came into land. I won't be watching that again.
This was all a bit mystifying as one of the main themes running through TGT1 and I expect TGT2.5 is that I tend to make a bit of a goose of myself in other countries(see previous entry, #smallafricancountrydebt). Another theme of TGT1 was poo stories, however, I've been informed by management this theme is not to be revisited, (don't know why, it was comedy gold.)
So no baggage issues, no tantrums, no dramas. Very odd.
However, I am the only member of TGT2.5 who isn't a clog wog (ie Swedish citizen) and I had to go through the "Other Countries" line once we reached customs at Heathrow, so the 4 clog wogs turned left and I turned right and headed off by myself for the next hour.
Now I'm not a big fan of being away from my family for any length of time and this slightly unnerved me. I felt like I was 19 again and travelling to the UK for the first time on my own, about to wander into Kings Cross and dodge people living in cardboard boxes on the footpath. A long way from Box Hill North I can tell you. The queue moved mighty slowly and I got to see a few baby meltdowns and one small vomit (don't miss that stage of child-rearing) and eventually, I got to the customs guy and I was a tad nervous. The reason being we don't actually have return tickets. We will buy them shortly but for the moment if he had asked me to show him my return ticket then frankly I was sunk and it could have got a bit ugly and strip searchy. Instead he asked me what type of academic I was and that stopped me in my tracks. Mental blank time. Still feeling like a bit of a fraud in the world of academia I wasn't sure whether to go the 5 syllables or less approach or the full 12-inch dance mix version. I blabbed something about environmental economics and the importance of taking the environment into consideration when evaluating projects blah blah blah (clearly went the dance mix version without realising it).
Turns out boring him to death was the correct approach. He quickly wilted, stamped my passport and sent me on my way. I rejoined the clog wogs and headed out with our correct bags to the weak summer sunshine of London.

Summer in London is pretty nice. Sunny and mild and very green. Mind you, Delia's aunt, Didi, had organised for a taxi to pick us up to take us straight to Gerrards Cross which is in the countryside just outside the M25 to the west. Gerrards Cross is very green and also very white.
Didi lives in a 400-year-old farmhouse on a few acres of land. Hard to imagine accommodation any more different to Abu Dhabi. Didi has previously had horses (currently looking after a couple of them), 4 dogs and countless chooks and an Aga in the kitchen. All very country idyl and a lovely return as we used to visit  Didi quite often when we were locals. The garden is iconic English cottage garden as well and Didi plays the role of upper-class English country gentry to a tee. Just don't tell anyone she was actually born in Melbourne! Always a handy bit of information to have over her just to keep her on her toes.

So TGT2.5 members 3-5 have been playing with the dogs, horses, chooks non stop as well as swimming in the pool and kicking the soccer ball around (trying not to destroy the flowers in the garden beds with limited success). Not a bad way to start the time in the UK. It's been pretty helpful actually being in such an idyllic setting as until we get to Sweden in a few weeks I'm working for a few hours in the morning before the kids get up and then a few hours after they go to bed.
Bit pooped actually.
We ventured into London the next day and reacquainted ourselves with the Tube, Buckingham Palace, the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey and Big Ben. All either new or semi-new to TGT2.5:3-5. Along the way from Buckingham Palace to the Houses of Parliament along the Bird Cage (what a great name for a street) we came across some people filming their skateboarding tricks. It must be admitted they were pretty impressive and we asked TGT2.5:3 what he thought of them. Well, we were glad we asked. Apparently, these fellas were all very famous in the world of skateboarding and Ben knew very well who they were and where they were from. I would have thought he would be itching to get a selfie with them and I was fully prepared to go full Dad mode and go up to them and ask if they'd mind having a photo with my starry-eyed son.
Apparently not.
Very stern response from TGT2.5:3 who threatened violence and legal action if I dared talk to them.
So after watching some ollies, shove its, kickflips, backside barley grind Beni ha nas, double-sided ledges, frontside flip funboxes, nose bonks, salad grinds and sex changes (apparently!) etc etc, we continued on our way to the London Eye, back across the Thames and headed home.
Like we never left.

Now, of course, Didi is passionate about classical music and she got some tickets to a local performance of a piano and cello duet. Turns out this chap is quite well known, in fact he was a soloist at Harry and Meghan's wedding! The musicians in question, Sheku Kanneh-Mason is quite the celebrity and here he was playing literally in a school village gym (look it up, Seer Green Church of England School) with 100 old duckies (and us! including us?) looking on. WTF? How do you play for a worldwide audience at a royal wedding one week and next week in front of the local classical music anaroks? Tell you what, they enjoyed it though, the old duckies were getting so into it I thought they were going to start a mosh pit at one point. Imagine the carnage with all those Zimmer frames and hip replacements. Me on the other hand just tried to stay awake. That's not to disparage Sheku and his sister in any way as they are clearly amazing. I am simply a philistine as Didi pointed out.
It seems the musical society in Seer Green is quite canny. They keep a close eye on the up and coming stars in the classical music world and book them in early. They booked Sheku 18 months ago. Clever.

One of the key highlights planned for this trip was a trip to the Harry Potter Studios and it was mighty impressive. We were all pretty excited but TGT2.5:5 was off the scale. This is the girl who got Delia to make a Luna Lovegood Lion hat (as seen in photographs she wore it most of the day and it's very impressive) and has regularly written to Hogwarts seeking admission.
The level of detail they put into everything was extraordinary. The model castle was simply amazing. The start of the tour is pretty remarkable as you enter into the Hogwarts Great Hall which has been left pretty much just as it was in the movies. Wonderful experience.
We got to ride a broomstick over London, get on the Hogwarts Express and drink butterbeer at the cafe. One of the guides noticed Maja's Lion hat and made sure we saw the real thing as we went around. I tried to put my head in the pensieve but discovered too late that they had covered the top with perspex. Donk. The 3 hours went by pretty fast and not surprisingly the shop at the end of the tour added to the small African country debt. Much as I wanted a Gryffindor Quidditch uniform, I had to draw the line somewhere.
The Harry Potter theme continued at Didi's house as one of her dogs is a Scottish Deerhound and is essentially Sirius Black in dog mode. Not only that but they filmed some of the Forbidden Forest in a park 5 mins up the road from Didi's house. Consequently it was all a bit unreal to be walking through the Forbidden Forest with Sirius Black galloping (BIG DOG) along beside us.

One of the complications of staying in a 400-year-old house is it's a bit wonky and there are lots of nooks and crannies for squirrels to sneak in and set up camp which is precisely what has happened in the cupboard outside the bedroom we're sleeping in. Didi was keen to evict the squattor so armed with walking sticks Delia and I opened the door and launched our attack. The squirrel put up a good battle, even attempting a counterattack at one point (sort of pathetic to watch 2 grown humans armed with sticks jump and squeal in fright when a 100gram squirrel runs around in a cupboard looking to escape. Not quite the image of hardened Australians who are fearless of redback spiders and tiger snakes we were trying to convey.) Eventually, Squizzy Squirrel found the escape hole we were hoping he'd use and we set about filling it up with expanding foam spray. This stuff is very effective however it is extremely sticky and the cupboard quite small, hence I had to sort of climb in to reach the hole. I'm a bit clumsy at the best of times so of course, I left the cupboard covered in sticky expanding foam. Think the scene when Mr Incredible gets caught in sticky bubbles. Now this stuff doesn't come off and my genetic endowment hasn't left me with a lot of hair, and let's just say I have less now with slightly more uneven coverage due to a quick haircut from Delia.

So now we move to a friend's house in Shepherd's Bush. TGT2.5 continues

The Grand Tour Episode 1

So there are a few things I have to lay on the table. Firstly, clearly my grand touring skills are a bit rusty and there seems to be a bit of a disturbing tendency for history to repeat itself. The last time Delia and I went on a grand tour was at the end of 2001 and we had some baggage issues then and just for the sake of consistency, we’ve had some baggage issues again.

Welcome to the Grand Tour Part 2.

In December 2001 Delia and I headed off on the original Grand Tour. We flew into Vietnam with our bicycles at the start of our cycle tour from Vietnam to Greece through China, over the Himalayas into Nepal, India across to Turkey and on to Greece (copies of that award-winning blog can be ordered at any good bookshops).

OK, it didn’t win any awards but my mum liked it. And no you can’t get it in any bookshops, I made that up too, but I do have a print out of it all if you really want to read it.

Back then as mum drove us to the airport she worried about a loose bicycle part I'd thrown into the bike box. Nah, it'll be fine, I told my mum. Of course, when we arrived in Vietnam the said part had disappeared necessitating immediate mechanical repairs after extensive haggling with street side bike shops who clearly knew they had us over a barrel. Johnno 0, Mum 24231.

The Grand Tour Part 2 is bigger and better in all sorts of ways. The main difference, of course, is there are now five participants, not 2, so maybe it should be the Grand Tour Part 2.5 if we get multiplicative and the logistical challenges facing us on the TGT2.5 have increased exponentially and are now quite daunting and baggage issues are just the start.

I don’t want to go into details but apparently, it’s possible to check your baggage limit 3 times and still get it wrong. How many university degrees do I have again? Anyway, the consequences of that basic mathematical error were eye wateringly expensive. So after settling the debt equivalent to a small African country, we got onto the plane.

Crikey.

Planes are different now. They are really quiet. You get your own screen and can play games and stuff. Extraordinary. Very different to TGT1 when we hopped on the Air Vietnam flight with a paper ticket, our fingers crossed and flight attendants wandering the cabin with mosquito spray. Suffice to say, it’s ridiculously civilised and Delia and I were able to safely ignore parts 3-5 of the family for nearly the whole 14-hour flight. Remarkable. I even watched a whole movie. I have form on this. We flew to Bali a few years ago and I watched the first 10 minutes of 7 films. Couldn’t commit.

So as I said TGT2.5 is bigger and better so we didn’t just have one luggage issue, we had to have another. We arrived in the stifling heat of Abu Dhabi at midnight local time or 6 am for our body clocks. All 5 members of TGT2.5 were a bit pooped to say the least and after clearing customs we collected our bags and caught a taxi to the hotel. All good so far. Or so we thought. We had boarded the plane with, well, I don’t know how many bags. A LOT. And as I said, my grand touring skills are a bit rusty, logistics are out of control, I was exhausted and I picked up the wrong bag didn’t I? Which bag? The one with all the kids clothes of course. Oh dear. So the next day in Abu Dhabi wasn’t spent doing touristy things but heading back out to the airport to return the bag (apologies to Elena from Moonee Ponds), try to track down our bag (someone else had taken it) and send on the parts of our luggage that we don’t need till Sweden straight there. That took a few hours. 

Not many people go to cargo parts of airports but they should. Very interesting in a warts and all kind of way. We had a taxi driver, Emily from Uganda, take us and she turned out to be a bit of a star. She is one of the 7 million immigrants in the UAE working crazy hard, living in insane conditions. She and her husband live in a room they share with 3 other couples. Yes, that’s right 8 people in one room. Their space being separated by strung up blankets. Meanwhile her 2 year old son is back in Uganda being raised by her mum so Emily can send money back to Uganda to pay for her 4 younger siblings to go to school as her father died. WTF?!?!!? Oh yes and Emily is a qualified nurse and speaks 9 languages. Might remind the kids of that when they are complaining about Netflix not working.

The bag was delivered to our hotel the next day.

We didn’t any touristy things that day as we were all a bit wrecked by the jet lag but we did meet up with Ahmed’s mum, Manal. For those of you who are unfamiliar with who Ahmed is, he has been living in our studio for about a year now and has sort of become part of the family and is in the process of completing year 12 (we hope). Manal took the difficult decision to send him to live with his brothers in Melbourne a few years ago but living with his much older brothers didn’t work out and he ended up with us. Naturally, we had to visit Manal when we found out she lived in Abu Dhabi where we just happened to be going. And of course, she was pretty keen to see just exactly who these people were who were looking after her son. There was a bit of a bonus factor in all this. Manal gave us the tick of approval (after specific instructions from Ahmed not to behave like we normally do at dinner time) which made her feel better and we got to meet a lovely person who took us out to dinner several times to places we would never have otherwise visited. Win win win.

We did a few touristy things in our time in Abu Dhabi. We visited the Grand Mosque which is frankly amazing and so ornate it’s a little bit hard to believe but first, we had to don the appropriate attire. Ben, Finley and I had to put on black tracksuit pants over our shorts and Delia had to put on a full robe and head covering. In 40 degree heat!!! Just walking from the taxi to the entrance almost melted us. It’s hard to describe how stifling and overwhelming the heat is in Abu Dhabi. And it gets hotter in July and August!!!

We also visited the literally breathtaking Lourve which they built over reclaimed land producing an astonishing structure in the process. That seems to be the theme of Abu Dhabi. There’s this tendency to reclaim land from the sea and produce these extraordinary buildings in complete defiance of the fact Abu Dhabi is in the brutal desert. It defies all the rules of geography about where towns should be built and seems to revel in that fact. I’m really not sure what to think.

We visited the Falcon hospital, literally in the middle of the desert. It would appear the Emiraties take their falconing pretty seriously and the hospital looks after literally thousands of privately owned falcons every year as well as breeding them and releasing injured ones back into the wild after they’ve been nursed back to health. We got to watch a falcon getting, well, let’s be honest, an expensive and elaborate pedicure and then held one. Man those birds are unnerving. It was as though the bird was deeply unimpressed with my dad jokes (no surprise there) and the disdain it managed to convey was impressive. Never have I been less inclined to pat an animal despite the encouragement of the workers there, especially after they’d just sharpened its beak and talons. Maja, perhaps wisely, declined the offer to hold the falcon.

We also visited the Yas Marina Formula 1 circuit, (reclaimed land), and the Emirates Palace as well as spending a lovely evening on the Corniche beach (reclaimed). There were many things we didn’t get to do as truly the heat was too much and we retired to the rooftop pool as soon as we could. Overall, an interesting place but winter must surely be the time to visit.

Now we are on our way to London. Starting to get the grand touring skills up to scratch, but tell you what, Ben has to ditch the jokes going through customs. That boy is gonna get arrested one day.