Achmed's Final Trip Report...

...and about bloody time, you are all probably thinking...

Sorry...I have a habit of not finishing off the trip reports soon after the trip ends. But here it is anyway, so stop fuckin' moaning.



Excitement is building - one more night in a hotel, then one on a plane, and I'll be home. After two weeks, it's going to be more than a pleasure being back, it''' be bloody heaven.

The only downer is that I have to fly out again on Sunday morning as I've been roped into meeting a client first thing on Monday. FFS. At least I'll get to spend Sunday with my folks and, in particular, Dad, whom I haven't seen in a while (when I got there, we worked it out - it had been two years).

Work was like any other work day here, except that I am now the one that is creating the documents, instead of reading them.

I took a lunchtime walk with the client PM, to see if I could sit him down for an informal chat over coffee at Starbucks, but we ended up marching to a supermarket for him to get his lunch. I had to pick up a takeaway at Starbucks as he wanted to get back to the office. These people have a need to be seen by management, very insecure.

Back at the hotel later, I started packing my case in readiness for an 08h30 checkout in the morning. I've bought a few things and it is difficult to close the damn thing. I may have to go and buy a 2nd hand-luggage case.

Dinner is the seafood buffet, and I start with two platefuls of sushi and then one of salads, along with a ZAR90 glass of wine. WTF, it's my last night here.

Come to think of it...why are some of the dishes made with chicken, when it's a seafood buffet? WTF?

I have just seen the largest langoustine in my life, waiting to be cooked, or maybe it was a tiger prawn. Whatever, I've seen smaller legal-size crayfish than this fuckin' thing!! No, I resisted it, settling on a mixed plate of various fish dishes, calamari, prawns and vegetables.

Cheese and biscuits done, almost finished my glass of wine, I decide to go and look for that new piece of luggage for my excess baggage.

I'm allowed 23kg in my case, plus a 7kg hand luggage, plus a laptop bag. I should be able to fit everything into those cases successfully. All the bulky, heavy stuff can go into the big case.

I bought the little case - less than ZAR300 - bargain. Now both cases close comfortably without having to jump up and sit on either to close them.

Just waiting to do my online check-in to book seat 19C, the same as I had coming over - the one with plenty of leg room, then I can hit the sack for the last night.

Packing finished, check-in done, blog updated with two gripping episodes of this trip, and I'm about whacked. Ready for bed...goodnight...



The day of the check-out...

The final episode of this gripping epic?

Didn't want to get out of bed...........kidding....shot out of bed at 06h30, finalised my packing so that I left my travel clothes in my new carry-on case, then headed for a final breakfast.

That done, I grabbed my stuff and headed for check-out where I ended up having a fight with the guy about who was paying for what. Your customer is always right, fuckwit. Or, at least in this case, I was right as I knew the client was picking up the tab for bed and internet charges. Just as well, as at ZAR200 a day in this hotel, it's a fuckin' rip-off. Fuckwit had to phone someone to confirm what I had already explained to him, but in the end all was good.

After checking my bags in with the Concierge, so that I didn't have to drag them into the office with me, I headed there for the last time.

As the final report was to be delivered by the 17th March, I had to send the first draft to the team for QA before I left for the day. As it was, I emailed it at 16h50, just in time to say cheerio to the guys in the office and an online farewell to the guys in Dubai.

After retrieving my bags at the hotel, I grabbed another cab and hit the highway for what I thought would be a short ride to the airport. Ha!!

It took us 45mins in traffic and on the ring road, supposedly the fastest route at that time of day. Past Yas Island where the F1 GP is held and Ferrari World. That's the closest I got to the place, about 500m.

The taxi cost me AED70 including tip, but it's cool cos I can claim the fare back again. Just as well I drew the extra AED100 earlier in the day.

I checked in my case, then took my hand luggage into the public bathroom where I did a Superman change of clothing into something more comfortable to travel in. A fresh t-shirt and jeans that haven't been washed in two weeks, very comfortable.

As is customary on these trips, once I checked through passport control, I hunted down the Swarovski shop and bought SWMBO a nice pair of earrings. I get something Swarovski for her on every trip I go on. She has quite a collection now.

Feeling a bit peckish, I grab a bagel and iced tea. I've still got two hours to take-off and probably another hour after that before anything edible or drinkable will be served on the plane.

I tried to get some wireless connection, but it wouldn't work so I think I'll just go and wait for my flight and read my book for a while.


On the plane...

For some unknown reason, probably a different make of aircraft, I didn't get the seat with the extra leg room. That ended up being 5 rows in front of me. Fuck.

Anyway, I settled in and we took off after a bit. I didn't care much, we were heading homeward.

The plane was about one third full (or two thirds empty, depending on how you look at things) and the row in front of me was empty too. I thought it was nice to have no possibility of someone banging the chair back at my legs in the cramped space I was now stuck in. No bloody luck.

There was a party of Ukranians heading for SA for a holiday and two of them ended up grabbing the row of four seats to themselves, so that they were directly behind friends of theirs who had been allocated seats seperately.

At cruising altitude, the seatbelt light went off and the crew came around with the drinks trolley. The big Ukrainian diagonally in front of me says to the hostess in his aisle "whiskee" and she plonks a glass down in front of him, served straight from the bottle of Dewars White Label. "Whiskee", he says again and she puts a second glass down. "Whiskee" he repeats for a third time and this time she looks perplexed, so she calls over the aircraft to her superior, tells her the story. The senior cabin lady looks over the the guy, motions a drinking action with her hand, says "Got two whiskeys, drink finished, we give more" and then carries on with her customer. The Russkie is so taken aback, that he doesn't say another word, doesn't even ask for more whiskee later on. He has his dinner, finishes his drinks and lies down across two seats and his wife's lap to get some sleep with his earphones on.

I watched "The Kings Speech" on the movie channel and, if you want to watch a good movie, go see this one. It's very good, but the Oscar should have gone to Geoffrey Rush who played the supporting role of the speech therapist. He was brilliant and had me chuckling quietly to myself. Colin Firth was good in his part, but I don't believe he was Oscar-winning good.

The rest of the flight went off uneventfully, managing to catch about 2hrs sleep before we were woken by the crew trying to serve us a snack and coffee before we landed in Shit Towne to drop off a bunch of people.

An hour later, with no new additions to the passenger list, we hit the skies again on the final stretch.

This leg of the trip went by very quickly as I was now fully awake, and ended up playing "Who Wants to be a Millionaire" on the flight games console. Once I even got close to answering all the questions, then fucked it up by pressing the wrong button with my final answer....knob.

We landed in Cape Town about 20mins ahead of schedule. According to the skipper, we had a tailwind behind us, but I think he just got wind that his "tail" was waiting for him in Cape Town airport.

SWMBO met me with the Mazda-rati, with Bonnie the Wonder Dog along for the ride and I drove home, the first time in over two weeks that I had driven a car. How strange it was being behind the steering wheel again, instead of sitting in the back seat of the car...


In conclusion, it was an interesting trip, lots to see and new experiences. Perhaps I'll have to go back again, to present the document to the client, but maybe not as I think the local team could do it successfully.

Ahhhh....it's good to be back in Slaapstad...




Achmed, out...