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Tales of PGK


pgkevet
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Jungle book

 

We're still in St Lucia and my wife decided that she was bored and needed some exercise. She had been reading tourist guides and had found a rainforest walk that she quite fancied. So we fired up the hire car and off we went.

 

Most of the roads in St Lucia are very good. None of the pothole fun stuff of our early Jamaican travels so we made great time for the first part of the trip.

 

The difficulty started when we had to hunt for the turning to the walk. Several false starts and then a little luck from a local resident and we left the highway and into the hills.

 

I'm used to driving on Caribbean dirt tracks but this one was extreme. There were a few times I just had to get out to check the wheel spacing on the ruts and the clearance on the sump but perseverance won and we made it to the starting point.

 

There was actually a hut there with a jungle ranger come guide. He had got there by tractor. We discussed the walk but he admitted it was well signed and a guide wasn't really necessary. So we left alone.

 

We were very much alone. Mine had been the only other vehicle parked by the hut.

 

The walk was supposed to be a few miles long and a circular route that finished where it started.

 

It also started out as really easy going. It was all steps cut into the muddy hillside with a thin stick and two uprights holding the edge in place. Step after step downhill. Each step had it's own bright yellow land crab king but they were the only animals we saw.

 

They call it rainforest because it's so muggy and humid. You can't sweat properly and might as well shed any shirts and let the sweat run. I stopped counting the steps when we got to difficult numbers and just stayed with looking at the palm trees and spotting the odd break in the canopy when I could see the sky. There were a lot of steps.

 

A mile and a half of steps later we got to the bottom of the valley. Here the reward is a beautiful waterfall and pool. Plenty of time for a cool swim and a laze before tackling the second half.

 

The only problem with going downhill is the inevitable uphill. More steps. Another couple of miles of steps. The novelty wears off after the first half mile. Then it's step, step, step. And the legs start to feel it. We cheered ourselves up with thoughts of how fit we would feel afterwards. I cheered myself up more by thinking about all the beers I would need to rehydrate.

 

Step, step, step. Even the crabs looked tired.

 

Step, step, step. But then daylight ahead and an open field! We followed the path across it and there was a dirt track T at the end. Left or Right? I had no way of orientating myself after 3 hours in the jungle. All I could tell was that it was generally getting a bit gloomier and early evening. The sun was down behind the hills somewhere.

 

We thought we might have walked more rights than lefts and that would mean the start should be right. A quarter mile later and yet another bend ahead and yet again so sign of the hut and car park. We walked back to the crossroads.

 

Time to try the left option. A quarter mile later and yet another bend ahead and yet again no sign of the hut or car park. We walked back to the crossroads.

 

My wife was starting to look worried. I scampered straight ahead across the next meadow but when I cleared the rise there was just more hills ahead. I walked back to the crossroads. It was getting gloomier.

 

There was only one sensible option left: to go back the way we had come.

 

It was easy going to begin with. It was downhill. It was all steps with little yellow land crabs. We could feel it in our thighs as we walked step, step, step..

 

At the bottom of the valley is a pool and waterfall. So what? Rinse your head and shirt in it and don't mess about. It was dark enough here last time. Now I can see very little - except for steps. And guess what? All these steps are uphill.

 

Step, step, step. I could hear my wife puffing behind me. I could feel my thighs burning. I wasn't even interested in my wife's thighs any more. Anyway she was crying now. Step, step, step.

 

I was using my hands to push down on my thighs. Step, step, step. My wife had stopped crying. She couldn't afford to waste the tears or the breath. Step, step, step.

 

I was trying work out the best way to cook land crab and Palm tree and how to light a fire in rainforest while I pushed down against my thighs and stepped, stepped...and then the end!

 

Yay! The last step and the hut with a little moonlight bouncing off it's roof. Our car still in the car park. Alone.

 

Surprisingly, there was a coloured chap in the hut. He had gathered some coconuts from the surrounding trees and kindly sold me a jelly coconut to drink. I asked him where the end of the path came out up here at the top.

 

"Easy man. It's just over a quarter mile that way."

 

Doh!

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I'll call this one 'One for the Road'.

 

"How about Cyprus this time?" My wife, V, asked. So we went.

 

It was October in Paphos and the day we landed it was obvious that Paphos itself wasn't going to entertain us. The town is just a tourist enclave with a tiny beach, tourist shops and Bars and Restuarants selling English food.

 

Cyprus is a country riddled with history and we wanted to see it so we hired a car.

 

Kostas cars looked best value. We came to call our rental 'Kost-a-lot's Deathmobile'

 

This was a small, girlie 4x4 with suspension that swayed, corroded floor plates and waivers on the insurance so that the sump, tyres and suspension weren't covered.

 

All the rentals were much the same. About the only thing it was worth doing in one of these cars was killing someone. You were insured for that; so long as the accident had nothing to do with the sump, suspension, tyres or anything else mechanical!

 

I refused to hire it without a test drive.

 

My test drive involved screaming up the road with a slipping fan belt and slamming on the brakes. V peeled herself off the windscreen and swore at me but at least the important bits worked. We signed.

 

Sometime later the suspension pulled the car body back onto the axles.

 

Metaled roads in Cyprus are fine. There's one that goes around the island and one that goes across. All the other roads are crushed rock. We picked a small town on the map, not too far away, and with a glance at the sun for a general heading aimed the car and set off for some country views and tea.

 

Driving along was a gentle affair. This was all about chugging up and down small rolling hills looking at the vineyards braided like corn rows and flat roofed stone and daub dwellings.

 

My wife screamed.

 

I don't know why she does that. It's quite off-putting when I'm hitting the brakes anyway.

 

Some kiddie on a bicycle had just freewheeled down a hillside and shot in front of the car. It was probably the one thing we were insured for but might have been a bit rough on the kid so I swerved the Deathmobile round him as the brakes were doing their thing. No problem. I don't drive fast through hillside villages, narrow tracks and packed shacks.

 

Back out into farm land and around the hillside.

 

My wife screamed.

 

I don't know why she does that. It's quite off-putting when I'm hitting the brakes anyway.

 

The road had vanished. Just on the bend and there was no road. I got out to look. The road had fallen off the hillside. There were a few feet of sudden drop where there must have been a small landslide some time ago. I hopped down and walked ahead. Around the next bend the road was back where it belonged and the way up was sloping rather than the sharp drop I stopped at.

 

I strolled back to the Deathmobile, backed her up and took a run. We jumped the drop and chugged around the bend and up the slope.

 

Sometime later the suspension pulled the car body back onto the axles.

 

We found the small town. I think it was closed. There was no sign of life. Perhaps everyone had fallen off the hillside and just left the houses? So much for tea.

 

Any married man knows that this is the time their wife starts complaining. Yes ,they want a drink and, yes, they want a pee. And yes, it's all my fault. I drove on in silence. I say silence; I was silent but V was just getting warmed up.

 

Around a gentle bend in a grove of trees I spotted a turning with a colourful Cyrillic sign pointing down a track. It looked promising so I pulled in. Down in a picturesque dell with a bubbling spring the trackway opened to a wide driveway with a broad, laden fig tree, a huge vine covered pergola over a large patio area with a couple of tables in front of a whitewashed single storey adobe house. If I was ever going to build a small restaurant in the country then I'd want it to look just like this.

 

We seated ourselves at the table but after waiting a short time we wandered in to find some service. I'd opened a couple of doors and found V the loo and then met an old lady.

 

I reckoned she could have been Aphrodite herself. She certainly looked about three thousand years old and with a nice smile and was pretty spritely for a someone that age. But then goddesses are immortal even if they don't age too well.

 

She spoke in the ancient language of the Gods - or it might have just been modern Greek. But either way we had a problem. Lots of sign language later and she went off to fetch some tea and munchies while wifey finished her comfort break and I grazed on figs and grapes.

 

We sat and drank our tea and I tried to engage Aphrodite in conversation. It didn't go so well with the language barrier and was mostly lots of gesticulation and smiling and nodding.

 

We finished our tea and I tried to pay. This was also a problem with lots more head shaking and gesticulation. In the end I shoved some money under my saucer, smiled, said 'thank you' politely and we left.

 

As we drove away V looked at me and said. "I don't think that was a restaurant."

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I call this one 'You can't beat Death'

 

Cyprus: Early morning and on the way to breakfast.

 

I love those buffet breakfasts in hotels with the opportunity to pig out almost endlessly on fruit, pastries and bacon and swill several cups of coffee on the terrace with a morning ciggy or two.

 

I was carrying the cup back from a refill and on my way to the terrace when I spotted a tourist brochure. The cover had a picture of a flamingo. I like big birds and flamingos are cool with the way the shrimp colour makes them go pink.

 

Amongst daft looking birds the pelican and the flamingo rank pretty high but the flamingo probably wins. Let's face it if you spend your life standing on one leg in shallow water then go the whole way and dye yourself girlie pink!

 

Why didn't I know that Cyprus was famous for the flamingos on it's salt lakes?

 

OK, accept I'm thick but this was the first I'd heard of them and I had often wondered about going to see flamingo in Africa just because the sight of tens of thousands of silly pink birds has to be worth the trip.

 

I showed the brochure to my wife V and trotted off to ask the receptionist more.

 

Flamingos in Cyprus pass through on their migration and aren't permanent residents so Receptionist kindly rang the tourist bureau to see if the flamingo were at home.

 

Result.

 

We finished breakfast, loaded up the Deathmobile and shipped out for Larnaca.

 

Deathmobile behaved itself pretty well en route. It was all metaled roads along the coast and only eighty odd miles to drive. Once one got used to the way it swayed around bends with the chassis swinging off the axles before the springs snapped it back somewhere later along the straight that is. And once one had got used to the screeching fan belt every time we had to stop and start. Otherwise it was a quiet trip.

 

I was looking forwards to seeing the flamingos. Flashbacks of massive flocks of thousands of busy birds crowded together and flights of hundreds taking off and landing into the crowds raced through my memories of TV documentaries. This was going to be cool.

 

We found the turning that takes one through parts of the Force's base and then curls around to the salt lake. I was ready for my wild flamingo flocks. We drove along the side of the salt lake and peered eagerly for the first glimpse.

 

Nothing.

 

I stopped the car and got out and consulted the map. It was the right place. There was the salt lake miles out in front. It's so shallow it's easy to see bottom stretching away. And away in the distance I could see a few small black dots. Flamingos?

 

It wasn't the thousands I had come to see and after driving eighty miles the five black dots weren't even flamingo-like this far away. Why were they right in the middle too?

 

V was laughing at my demands to see pink.

 

Then I pointed out that we must have hired a 4x4 for a reason and I was going to get close enough to see these flamingos in colour. Five black dots wasn't enough. So over the earth bank we went and splashed the Deathmobile into the water.

 

Deathmobile chugged and gurgled in the salt lake quite happily. I had the door open to watch the water level against the sills and listen to the struggling exhaust. It might be embarrassing to ring Kosta-a-lot cars and have to explain that Deathmobile had drowned. The bottom stayed firm as Deathmobile swam out to sea but those black dots weren't getting any bigger.

 

I stayed in low gear and pushed my luck until the dots became pink dots and V shrieked.

 

She's like that when her feet get wet and it's a bit annoying.

 

I suppose she was right. We were out in the middle of the salt lake and the

exhaust was spitting and spluttering and the ripples were washing over the sills and the dots were pink. So I turned Deathmobile back to the shore.

 

Up on the other side of the banking I parked Death on the slope and opened the doors to let the water run out. Most of it was running out through the floor anyway which was probably why quite so much had got in in the first place.

 

A Cypriot woman was walking down the road pushing a pram. I asked her where the flamingos were.

 

"They are right behind you." she said "Oh, they've gone. They were there an hour ago."

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Spoonerisms.

 

You may not know their origin in the Oxford Don Dr Spooner who became famous for his inadvertent mixing up of words. The classic example always used to be '.take the next town drain' when he referred to the 'next down train'.

 

Checking online there are many other classics attributed to Dr Spooner. I like the one where he is greeting a new lady undergraduate at a reception and meaning to say 'You will soon be as mad as a hatter, of course' it comes out as 'You will soon be had as a matter of course'.

 

But I digress from my story.

 

We go back here to around the mid 70's. I was working in a busy Practice west of London. The woman in charge of the local Cats Protection League wasn't my easiest client and on the day in question it was her own cat that we had in for surgery.

 

Mrs. H would probably have been quite patient over a CPL cat but not when it was her own. And, as someone who we say almost every day with yet another sick rescue, she obviously thought she was entitled to special considerations.

 

Back in the early 70's anaethesia was usually induced with barbiturates. And if any of the drug got inadvertently injected outside the vein or if the doses were marginally high for that patient or if they were given very slowly then it was possible to have very slow recoveries.

 

Mrs H's cat was in for a minor job but cat's recovery was prolonged. Not prolonged in any scary way back then and we really didn't have concerns but Mrs H did. Mrs H was ringing up about every hour to find out how cat was doing. And Mrs H ringing up every hour was starting to get on my bits because it was interfering with all my other work.

 

During the later part of the afternoon there was yet another call. Cat had been recovering slowly so while nurse had the telephone I nipped out to the kennels for

another check. Cat was sitting up and fine.

 

Assuming that my nurse had the phone on 'hold' I bellowed at her 'Tell Mrs C she can have her effing hat back anytime'

 

It's a shame that the phone wasn't on hold and Mrs H was called Mrs Hunt...

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Call this one: Job Done.

 

Thinking back, my old man must have been a saint. He surely had the patience of one and I must have been a horrid kid to bring up. He always let me get right in the mire before he extricated me so that I would learn the lesson properly and sometimes he must have laughing inside as he saw the progress.

 

When I was around eleven or twelve years old we moved to the village and behind the house and it's large garden is some eighty acres of landfill gone wild. That field belonged to a family friend who had sold Dad the plot he built our house on and I had permission to mess about as much as I wanted to.

 

Carte Blanche for a kid like me was heaven. The first summer I co-opted the other three boys in the village with my master plan. We were going to build a raft and sail down the river. The river was only three quarters of a mile away at it closest and we would build the raft in the front garden and drag it down.

 

So we started felling trees with a hatchet. There was a large stand of tall willow with foot diameter trunks and we painstakingly chopped a load of them down, cut them into twenty foot lengths and dragged them home. They were then lashed together into an amazing raft.

 

I'd been reading stories about Kontikki and my keen labour force and I assembled our craft with intention to sail down the river to the sea and away. That meant a substantial thing with a cabin on top.

 

My old man must have been laughing inside. He let us get on with it as this vessel was constructed on the driveway. It kept us occupied for a few weeks of the summer holidays until we were done.

 

It was only then that he pointed out quite how much this thing must weight and happily helped us fix a suitable tow-rope to it and demonstrated that our combined strength including his car hitched to it and it wasn't going anywhere! We couldn't even lever one end up on rollers.

 

I was gutted. I brooded for a couple of days before coming up with Plan B. This involved the gang and myself carrying out a detailed survey before we were ready to start. Dad did let us begin work before he vetoed Plan B and to be fair he vetoed it mostly on the grounds that my proposed 'canal to the river and float the raft down' was going to cross three gardens, half a mile of farmers fields and perhaps more significantly the main village road, electrical conduits and gas main...

 

The next summer I decided to be practical and build a canoe. Dad was all for this and even took me down to the woodyard and negotiated a price for the timber. All I had to do was earn half the money and he'd stump up the rest.

 

I mowed lawns and did odd jobs for weeks to earn my half and Dad kept his word. My first canoe was a fourteen footer that I built in the attic. We had to get the timber up there through the window at one end because the timbers were just too long to go through the loft hatch.

 

I worked up there for many weeks before the thing was finished and my supportive Dad was ready with his Plan B if we couldn't get it out of the hatch. It did just make it but he explained he had been game to take off some tiles if necessary and take it out through the roof.

 

The gang and I played with canoe one for the rest of the summer but it was

only a single seater. By the summer after I decided it was too small and sold it for enough to make canoe two..a much larger two-seater model.

 

This time I built it in my bedroom, on the diagonal, and slept on the floor. Once again Dad helped where necessary but mostly let me get on with it. It was only when it was finished that this thick kid realised the door was on the other diagonal!

 

Once again Dad to the rescue. He had worked out that angling it floor to ceiling and ripping the coving away and hanging my sister from the middle just bowed the thing enough to pull it round. Canoe two got launched.

 

I had grandiose plans for a river camping trip. Yes, I'd been reading 'three men in a boat' that year. My best friend was keen and my old man used his influence to persuade his parents. A test day was arranged and best friend and I took canoe two to the river and set off.

 

There was a severe gale that day and as we rounded a bend where the river ran in a deep cutting the wind caught us and we went over. We grabbed onto the boat and swam it ashore, found all our stuff and trudged back over the fields carrying the canoe home to check and mend it.

 

My best friends parents wouldn't let him come with me after that even though my Dad did his best to argue that OK, we had turned over but we had sorted ourselves out, come to no harm apart from getting wet and we had got ourselves home. Dad was happier still to let us go but best friends parents wouldn't budge.

 

Plan B. Dad and I had a great trip down the river.

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Let's call this one: The vatman cometh.

 

When I first bought my business one of the first things I did was, I suspect like many others, to sit down and work out how much I could fiddle.

 

In my case I looked at it as high, medium and low risk fiddles and rejected the first two rapidly. I won't pretend that inherent honesty had as much to do with it as the fact that I never fancied jail. I would say that I'm probably far more honest than most folk but somehow we all view the tax system as something to beat. But the vat-man has scary powers and a nasty attitude.

 

When I looked at low risk fiddles I decided that the small amount of virtually untraceable fiddle wasn't worth it. So I ran my business squeaky clean.

 

The time for another vat inspection came due. I was putting all the stuff together for that and my bad sense of humour kicked in. So about three-quarters of the way down the pile I slipped in a deliberate mistake and made a note to that effect in a sealed envelope in my desk drawer.

 

I then completely forgot about the vat-man's visit.

 

My office is at home but HM's inspector naturally turned up at my Practice. One of my nurses came into the operating theatre to tell me. I asked her to show the man in since I was just carrying out a simple dog castration on a large yellow labrador.

 

I offered the man my apologies, explained I couldn't exactly stop and that I had another long-winded job to do after this one. So he was given directions to my home around the corner and my wife was rung to expect him.

 

It so happened that my next case had cancelled and I got home earlier than expected.

 

All my past inspections had been a single visitor who plodded through books and computer records solo but this time I had three suits in my office.

 

Mr Big was sitting in my comfy chair with the Times crossword while his juniors did the work. At least Penguin and the Riddler had their accomplices in stripey tops. These looked young, scrubbed and wearing their Burton's best.

 

Mr Big accepted my coffee bribe but apparently henchmen aren't allowed refreshment. I left them to it and had my coffee downstairs.

 

In due course a henchman was sent to get me and Mr Big informed me that the inspection had found no irregularities.

 

"What? Do you realise I put a deliberate mistake in there and your guys haven't found it! I'll be kind and tell you it's more than halfway down."

 

Mr Big looked peeved but made them start again. I handed him my envelope and left them to it while I had lunch.

 

I was summoned again when they had found the error. Mr Big was still looking 'a bit miffed'. I suspect he'd missed his early afternoon tee slot.

 

"OK Mr. K, That part of the inspection has concluded. I just have to ask you about any other income you have."

 

I don't have any other income but I just couldn't resist 'hmm-ing' and 'aa-ing' a bit. And then my bad sense of humour kicked in. It does get me in trouble.

 

"Come on Mr K. Any other income?"

 

"I'm sorry but I'm not allowed to talk about it. It's confidential." I replied.

 

"I am a senior member of Customs and Excise, Mr K. You must disclose."

 

He sent the kiddies to wait in the car and pressed me further. I was on a roll with my nonsense and insisted on knowing if he was a signatory to the Official Secrets Act. That was when I thought I might have gone too far because he dragged a card from his wallet that meant Mr Big was really MR BIG. I had no choice but to go through the verification process. 'Gulp'.

 

"Now Mr K. Tell me all about it."

 

"Well." I hesitated "I'm employed by your department.."

 

"If you were employed by my department I would know." He was losing his patience.

 

"It is a special service I carry out for your department for retiring VAT inspectors" I carried on; burying myself in the muck. "They are obviously keeping the knowledge from you."

 

"No more hesitation Mr K. What service for retiring officers?"

 

"Well.. You saw what I was doing to that dog this morning.."

 

He left red-faced, got into his car and said nothing to the juniors as he drove away.

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Let's call this one: The vatman cometh.

 

When I first bought my business one of the first things I did was, I suspect like many others, to sit down and work out how much I could fiddle.

 

In my case I looked at it as high, medium and low risk fiddles and rejected the first two rapidly. I won't pretend that inherent honesty had as much to do with it as the fact that I never fancied jail. I would say that I'm probably far more honest than most folk but somehow we all view the tax system as something to beat. But the vat-man has scary powers and a nasty attitude.

 

When I looked at low risk fiddles I decided that the small amount of virtually untraceable fiddle wasn't worth it. So I ran my business squeaky clean.

 

The time for another vat inspection came due. I was putting all the stuff together for that and my bad sense of humour kicked in. So about three-quarters of the way down the pile I slipped in a deliberate mistake and made a note to that effect in a sealed envelope in my desk drawer.

 

I then completely forgot about the vat-man's visit.

 

My office is at home but HM's inspector naturally turned up at my Practice. One of my nurses came into the operating theatre to tell me. I asked her to show the man in since I was just carrying out a simple dog castration on a large yellow labrador.

 

I offered the man my apologies, explained I couldn't exactly stop and that I had another long-winded job to do after this one. So he was given directions to my home around the corner and my wife was rung to expect him.

 

It so happened that my next case had cancelled and I got home earlier than expected.

 

All my past inspections had been a single visitor who plodded through books and computer records solo but this time I had three suits in my office.

 

Mr Big was sitting in my comfy chair with the Times crossword while his juniors did the work. At least Penguin and the Riddler had their accomplices in stripey tops. These looked young, scrubbed and wearing their Burton's best.

 

Mr Big accepted my coffee bribe but apparently henchmen aren't allowed refreshment. I left them to it and had my coffee downstairs.

 

In due course a henchman was sent to get me and Mr Big informed me that the inspection had found no irregularities.

 

"What? Do you realise I put a deliberate mistake in there and your guys haven't found it! I'll be kind and tell you it's more than halfway down."

 

Mr Big looked peeved but made them start again. I handed him my envelope and left them to it while I had lunch.

 

I was summoned again when they had found the error. Mr Big was still looking 'a bit miffed'. I suspect he'd missed his early afternoon tee slot.

 

"OK Mr. K, That part of the inspection has concluded. I just have to ask you about any other income you have."

 

I don't have any other income but I just couldn't resist 'hmm-ing' and 'aa-ing' a bit. And then my bad sense of humour kicked in. It does get me in trouble.

 

"Come on Mr K. Any other income?"

 

"I'm sorry but I'm not allowed to talk about it. It's confidential." I replied.

 

"I am a senior member of Customs and Excise, Mr K. You must disclose."

 

He sent the kiddies to wait in the car and pressed me further. I was on a roll with my nonsense and insisted on knowing if he was a signatory to the Official Secrets Act. That was when I thought I might have gone too far because he dragged a card from his wallet that meant Mr Big was really MR BIG. I had no choice but to go through the verification process. 'Gulp'.

 

"Now Mr K. Tell me all about it."

 

"Well." I hesitated "I'm employed by your department.."

 

"If you were employed by my department I would know." He was losing his patience.

 

"It is a special service I carry out for your department for retiring VAT inspectors" I carried on; burying myself in the muck. "They are obviously keeping the knowledge from you."

 

"No more hesitation Mr K. What service for retiring officers?"

 

"Well.. You saw what I was doing to that dog this morning.."

 

He left red-faced, got into his car and said nothing to the juniors as he drove away.

:bandit::bowdown:

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