Gullibilicus’ Fourth only works if it’s a new acquaintance that’s being met for the first time, and the airport management haven’t anticipated the issue. Ezeiza provides us with both. First off, we’ve been here before, and second the authorities have provided an exclusion zone where you’re screened from the taxi touts, the baggage hustlers and the mellée of waiting extended families, the meet and greeters. A place to find onward ground transport from approved providers, where the tariff is fixed, displayed and you pay before you climb aboard. Spendicus’ First applies, however Parsimonius scoticus will just have to grin and bear it as there’s not a great deal of alternative in the evening and after two days of sleepless travel.
At the block, the same faces are at the concierge’s desk, the same tea bags are in the same jar, the bikes are hanging just as we left them, even the boiler starts first time. The German panaderia is still around the corner, the Bazaar Plastico is still at the bottom of the street. Fresh chipas for breakfast, new boxes for the dry goods.
It’s these familiarities, these same old acquaintances that displace any semblance of culture shock. We know the rules, we’ve got our breathing space, and a place to regroup. The camp stove is overhauled, the tent zippers replaced. The Lambeg drum is dismantled to reveal it’s smuggled contents. Tyres fitted, wheels mounted, gears replaced, then cursed the manufacturer who has altered the spec., bike maintenance completed, now for a road test. Climb the garage ramp: the steepest ascent this side of the Andes, turn left onto the ripio-like cobbles and a spin north to Tigre and the Delta. No jumping gears, no grinding brakes, no squealing hubs. All is as it should be. The ride is just right. This is my bike. It’s been a year and a half, yet it feels like meeting an old friend. We simply pick up where we left off. A short break in a longer journey.
Monday, 29 October 2012
Thursday, 25 October 2012
Parsimonius puritanicus
Experticus’ Law: “The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men Gang aft Agley”
There are just a few laws and theorems that pertain to the initial moments on a journey. The most pertinent of which are:
Spendicus’ First law of Travel: Your first and last two days of travel will be the most expensive.
Muchas Extremicus’ Second Law, a corollary of the first, states that the airport, station or port that you arrive at or depart from, will be at the furthest extent from your first or last nights accommodation.
Optimisticus’ Third Theorem suggests that if you have an excessive lay-over on a multi flight itinerary, your baggage will be first off the carrousel. If you have but moments for a transfer, the lottery belt will break down.
Gullibilicus’ Fourth Law postulates that a traveller is at his or her most vulnerable to exploitation in the first moments upon arrival at a new destination.
Has the airport left your boxed bikes on the forecourt, to be rendered down to papier-maché, so they can deliver them four days later? Are they anxious to persuade you to return home to an already rented out house? Do they have issues with your dirty shoes? The common denominator to many of these hiatuses is not difficult to extrapolate: a certain national carrier and a particular airport that serves the south-east of England. So from experience comes enlightenment. Fly with the Franco-Dutch. Over-engineer the packaging.
Our worn out cycling comestibles, the gears, wheels and tyres are up for renewal, and their replacements are packaged in what looks like a big bass drum. Parading along Edinburgh’s Princes Street, I feel like a refugee from a Drumcree march. Parading suggests organisation, rectitude and order, when the reality is a dodgem shuffle between tour bus touts and Asian tourists with cameras. Just how many pictures does one need of the Garden’s pigeons?
Fact, not theory: bicycle panniers are the most unwieldy of packages when not attached to a bicycle.
As to why we’re partaking of public transport, that can be blamed on a collusion between Parsimonius Scoticus and Puritanicus Albas. The latter has argued that, as a trip relies on self propulsion and independence, then it should start at your own front door; but as our bikes are stored in an Argentine garage, we can’t cycle to the airport, so the next best option is the X6 and the Airlink. The former’s contribution was to suggest that we fly the first leg the previous day, on the grounds that a bus in the middle of the day would be cheaper than a taxi in the middle of the night. Anyway they’ve got recliner seats airside at Schiphol, it’s only a 13 hour lay-over, and who can sleep soundly when you know that you’ve got to rise at 2.30?
It’s only at check-in that we encounter the first challenge to Parsimonius’ Law: they only hold in-transit baggage for 12 hours, would we please recover and recheck-in our kit. Unfortunately there’s no comfy recliner ground side, there’s no Rijksmuseum to peruse, but more crucially, there’s no tax-free coffee and waffles. Parsimonius decides that he had better downgrade his law to theorem status, with the excuse that ‘it was a good idea at the time’
It’s at check-in time that our quasi-Lambeg drum looks less out of place, as it appears to have moved off of the street and into the concert hall, it’s been joined by an orchestra of cellos and double basses. Which makes for an interesting baggage reclaim hall at Ezeiza, and it certainly interests the customs fraternity when it passes through their x-ray machine. Argentina have imposed an imported goods limit of USD300 per family, and a tax levy for excesses that would make the French premier blush. We had spent some time revaluing our replacements, and wishing that we had actually spent what we are claiming. But this is Argentina, and they didn’t even ask for the document. The ‘good cop’ even suggested that we looked like ‘cycle travellers’, which was odd as we had yet to acquire our burnt noses and earlobes.
Through officialdom, now for Gullibilcus’ Fourth Law.
There are just a few laws and theorems that pertain to the initial moments on a journey. The most pertinent of which are:
Spendicus’ First law of Travel: Your first and last two days of travel will be the most expensive.
Muchas Extremicus’ Second Law, a corollary of the first, states that the airport, station or port that you arrive at or depart from, will be at the furthest extent from your first or last nights accommodation.
Optimisticus’ Third Theorem suggests that if you have an excessive lay-over on a multi flight itinerary, your baggage will be first off the carrousel. If you have but moments for a transfer, the lottery belt will break down.
Gullibilicus’ Fourth Law postulates that a traveller is at his or her most vulnerable to exploitation in the first moments upon arrival at a new destination.
Has the airport left your boxed bikes on the forecourt, to be rendered down to papier-maché, so they can deliver them four days later? Are they anxious to persuade you to return home to an already rented out house? Do they have issues with your dirty shoes? The common denominator to many of these hiatuses is not difficult to extrapolate: a certain national carrier and a particular airport that serves the south-east of England. So from experience comes enlightenment. Fly with the Franco-Dutch. Over-engineer the packaging.
Our worn out cycling comestibles, the gears, wheels and tyres are up for renewal, and their replacements are packaged in what looks like a big bass drum. Parading along Edinburgh’s Princes Street, I feel like a refugee from a Drumcree march. Parading suggests organisation, rectitude and order, when the reality is a dodgem shuffle between tour bus touts and Asian tourists with cameras. Just how many pictures does one need of the Garden’s pigeons?
Fact, not theory: bicycle panniers are the most unwieldy of packages when not attached to a bicycle.
As to why we’re partaking of public transport, that can be blamed on a collusion between Parsimonius Scoticus and Puritanicus Albas. The latter has argued that, as a trip relies on self propulsion and independence, then it should start at your own front door; but as our bikes are stored in an Argentine garage, we can’t cycle to the airport, so the next best option is the X6 and the Airlink. The former’s contribution was to suggest that we fly the first leg the previous day, on the grounds that a bus in the middle of the day would be cheaper than a taxi in the middle of the night. Anyway they’ve got recliner seats airside at Schiphol, it’s only a 13 hour lay-over, and who can sleep soundly when you know that you’ve got to rise at 2.30?
It’s only at check-in that we encounter the first challenge to Parsimonius’ Law: they only hold in-transit baggage for 12 hours, would we please recover and recheck-in our kit. Unfortunately there’s no comfy recliner ground side, there’s no Rijksmuseum to peruse, but more crucially, there’s no tax-free coffee and waffles. Parsimonius decides that he had better downgrade his law to theorem status, with the excuse that ‘it was a good idea at the time’
It’s at check-in time that our quasi-Lambeg drum looks less out of place, as it appears to have moved off of the street and into the concert hall, it’s been joined by an orchestra of cellos and double basses. Which makes for an interesting baggage reclaim hall at Ezeiza, and it certainly interests the customs fraternity when it passes through their x-ray machine. Argentina have imposed an imported goods limit of USD300 per family, and a tax levy for excesses that would make the French premier blush. We had spent some time revaluing our replacements, and wishing that we had actually spent what we are claiming. But this is Argentina, and they didn’t even ask for the document. The ‘good cop’ even suggested that we looked like ‘cycle travellers’, which was odd as we had yet to acquire our burnt noses and earlobes.
Through officialdom, now for Gullibilcus’ Fourth Law.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)