High life
End of the line
Taki
has been said, written, and but why, oh why, do the travel? Athens airport last ust like those mob scenes we able to enjoy in the air- coolness of a cinema, while ans riot against the Raj. The missing were the Bengal Lan- Iknow it sung before, wrong people week looked j used to be conditioned watching Indi only things cers. And G confusion, a runga Din. But the noise, id sweaty humans rubbing against each other were straight out of central casting. This time it was British Airways that pulled the plug on the unsus- pecting public. It seems that TWA had decided enough was enough and closed their offices in Greece once and for all. They had had enough because they had endured lightning strikes for the last 12 years and, being a private company, they said to hell with the Greeks and decided to look elsewhere.
But just as the rest of the world has learned a thing or two from us Hellenes, so have the neo-Hellenes learned something from the British. How to strike and disrupt people's lives, to be precise. So, last week, a lightning strike was called by BA for the last two days of August, which meant that the thousands of fools who prefer cancer- ous rays to healthy walks in the Scottish or English countryside, got stranded in the hottest and ugliest airport this side of Teheran, and when I say stranded I mean stranded. There were as many BA person- nel to help out as there are Puerto Ricans in Debrett's, or Monagasque Victoria Cross winners. In fact, BA had closed down their offices altogether, and I assume had sent every one of their employees to the beach to join the Greek Prime Minister and his Cabinet.
Now the reason I am boring you with all this is not to tell one more airport horror story. On the contrary. My gripe is with the people — mostly British — who just sacked out on the steaming floors, sweat- ed, slapped their howling children, and — I later heard — went peacefully to sleep when night came. I certainly know what Churchill would have thought, or done, had he witnessed such a spectacle, but I sure know what I think. These simply could not be the same people who once managed to fit both feet of the denizens of India and most of Africa into one shoe (Greek expression) and even managed to stop German panzers from parading down the Mall (and contrived it despite having the French as allies).
Which brings me back to the wrong people travelling nowadays. Once upon a time, in the Sudan, two friends of mine and I were told to disembark from a Sudan Air flight in order for some joke minister to board with his flunkeys and entourage. The rest of the first-class passengers got off — they were mainly Indians and Arabs but my two English buddies, a Pole, and myself, refused. There was as much chance of us getting off the plane as there was of Gamal Abdel Nasser replacing the monkey that the Russians had put into orbit that week. Mind you, back in those pre- hijacking days it was easy to browbeat the natives. Nevertheless, if more people stood up for their rights against the tyranny of a few bureaucrats and minorities, life would be far easier for people like myself who like travelling in comfort.
Needless to say, that particular day in Athens last week, was the first time I had travelled with the ex-wife, two children and nanny together. Being a prudent man, I had sent someone ahead to check us all in and take the brunt of the mob. The next day, and for the first time in ten years, I flew Olympic because of force majeure, as they say in France. For Olympic, whose airport is an exact replica of Saigon circa April 1975, I sent two people in advance. After they had checked us in and beaten back the mobs, we arrived and went straight into the business-class lounge, which makes the Coach and Horses seem like Blenheim by comparison. Although the flight was only 30 minutes late, the Greeks began to shout abuse at the person- nel, who, I must admit, tried to show concern and pretended to do something about it by picking up various telephones and shouting at persons unknown.
Which once again brings me to the point I wish to make. Last year the neo-Hellenes took the proverbial bull by the horns and beat up a couple of Olympic bureaucrats, and things got marginally better. (Well, not even marginally, but at least the arrogance is less.) If only the Brits would follow suit, perhaps BA might also im- prove. And before any of you take me to task for preaching violence, pray, I am not. I am simply saying that as long as people lie down and play dead, the bureaucrats will without fail step all over them. The empire was won by people who wouldn't take no for an answer.
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