The 'Odd'yssey (Part 1)

This past fortnight has been as complex as any since we left on our travels, with a combination of packing up our lives ready for the next move to Qatar, combined with the last week or so of work with the attendant farewells. Tuesday July 15^th saw our dining table and chairs disappear to the home of one of the other members of staff. On the following day most of our possessions (packed into tea chest sized boxes) were loaded onto a truck to make the trip to Qatar. This left Wayne and Meg in a largely empty house with just a couple of suitcases. Compensating this has been the fact that more people have been taking the opportunity to invite us out as they know we are leaving, so we haven't been spending much time at home anyway.

On the Wednesday evening there was a camp out at the school for the boys who had behaved particularly well during the final term. We were invited to the barbeque dinner as the guests of honour, which was lovely. However, on our arrival Meg discovered one of the boys rubbing his eye which looked very sore. In fact, on closer inspection, the white of his eye seemed to be swelling up. Along with one of the other staff members she took him to the hospital, having rung his mother (who asked her to also call the student's father so that he wouldn't accuse her of lying to him). When they had been waiting a while the boy's father arrived, however he left after an hour or so because he was tired. Eventually, it was determined that the student had had a piece of ash fly into his eye from the barbeque and that he would need to have eye drops for the next few days. His mother had rung the hospital to make sure that he wouldn't be taken home, so at 9:50pm they arrived back at the school. His eye drops had to be refrigerated and administered every two hours; so that evening we found ourselves up at 11:50, 1:50, 3:50, and 5:50, walking out to the tents and putting eye drops into his eye.

Come the weekend we were still recovering from the broken sleep of Wednesday night however we were determined to get out and do things. Saturday saw us drive to Brents Cross to pick up some farewell gifts, sell our clothes dryer to another member of staff, and go to the movies to see 'Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince' [Meg's verdict, 'good']. The following day was overcast with intermittent rain so we went down to Enfield to buy a couple of books with the credit we had accrued at Waterstones. We had lunch in a wonderful pub called 'The Victoria' and then, to kill some time, decided to go to the movies again and watch a double feature of 'Public Enemies' [Meg's verdict, 'excellent'] and 'The Hangover' [Meg's verdict, 'not my taste but very funny and still enjoyable']. That evening saw us venture to Stansted Abbots where a former member of staff was compeering a quiz night. Given that the majority of questions were based on British television we were very pleased to not finish last and it was lovely to see her once more.

The following Monday saw the farewell of another staff member (in the last 12 months there have been 17 members of teaching, boarding or ancillary staff leave the school). Most schools in the county had already finished on the previous Friday but because of the scheduling of training days for staff we were left with two extra days and a bunch of students who were resentful that all their friends were already on holidays. This was complicated by a number of staff and students being off sick and by the end of the day we had our first two confirmed cases of Swine Flu. Although classes were smaller the students that were present were very uptight at everything that was happening.

Tuesday was a very emotional day, being the final day for 5 members of the teaching staff and one of the students (who had been informed the night before that he is changing both his foster placement and his school). Meg made a wonderful speech that all the other staff had trouble following and which saw some of the toughest students in the school overcome with tears. After farewelling the students it was time for saying 'adieu' to many of the other staff with whom we had become quite close. In what is quite a difficult situation the non-management members of staff have banded together to provide support for each other and the students, and we will miss them.

Wednesday saw us packing up our suitcases and the remainder of the house so that three of the single female members of staff can move in there in September. We went into Hoddesdon to organise banks, post office redirects and cancel our account with the library then came back to farewell our home for the last 12 months. One of the other staff members took us to her home (which is much closer to Heathrow) and in the evening a couple of our other friends came over to have dinner and play Singstar before we crashed into bed at around 1:30 am.

Later that morning, at 4:30 am, the alarms went off and we were soon up and packed into Trish's car to make the trip to Heathrow Terminal 4. Our car, Madge, had been sold to another member of staff and had been left in the car park at school for that person to pick up the next time she is in. The trip was relatively quick, and without too many tears we were at the airport ready to book in for our flight to the USA. It was at this point that things began to get interesting again.

Our flights had been booked so that we would fly out from Heathrow at 8:50am to Detroit, Michigan. From there we were changing planes and heading for Houston, Texas to stay with Meg's High School friend, Christine, and some of her extended family. However, when we were queuing to load our baggage we were handed a piece of paper which said that Northwest Airways (the partners of KLM, with whom we had booked the flight) had overbooked and offering us US$1000.00 per person and a night in a hotel if we would be prepared to wait until the following day to fly. Because our time was flexible we were 2 of only 4 people who elected to take the offer and consequently our bags were marked 'Do Not Load' and we moved through Customs and Security to the Northwest Service area to find out where we would be staying and what time our flights would be.

During the wait we got to know the other two ladies who had elected to also be bumped. One was a Canadian teacher who had spent the last 12 months teaching at a school just down the A10 from us in Edmonton, North London. Her mother had been intending to drive down to Detroit to pick her up and take her back across the border to Canada. The second lady was an IT professional from North Carolina who had been in the UK on business. From Detroit she had been booked to fly to Greensboro where her husband was going to pick her up. They were both to make a number of phone calls over the following two hours to clarify their plans and to stop family members from travelling needlessly.

After an hour or so it became clear that we would not be staying in a hotel after all. Instead the airline was going to try to fit us on to alternate flights to other parts of the United States from where we would be able to make connections to our destinations. For our Canadian friend this meant flying to Minneapolis, Minnesota and then catching another flight to Detroit. However, for the lady from South Carolina she was going to be sent to Minneapolis; from there to Atlanta, Georgia; and from there to Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina. This meant her husband would have to change the destination where he would be picking her up and, rather than arriving in the mid afternoon, she would not be touching down till close on Midnight. For ourselves, we would also be flying to Minneapolis and then flying from there direct to Houston, although our arrival time had also been changed from mid afternoon to 9:25pm.

We were able to use some other vouchers from the airline to buy breakfast and then lunch before finally being presented with our $1000.00 in the form of vouchers for flights with Northwest/KLM which have to be used within the next 12 months. Then we boarded the flight to Minneapolis, all sat within a few seats of one another near the front of the aircraft. Meg had no one in front of her so leg room was not an issue and, in all, apart from being very tired it was quite a comfortable flight. Wayne was able to watch 'Gran Torino' and 'Milk' while Meg took in 'He's Just Not That IntoYou' and '17 Again'. On our arrival in Minneapolis we said goodbye to our new friends and went off in search of our luggage. Not entirely to our surprise (given the signs that had been put on our bags back at Heathrow), it was nowhere to be found. When we asked for assistance, we were told just to continue on our flight to Houston and enquire about retrieving our bags on arrival.

The twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, are the home of Wayne's favourite baseball team, the Minnesota Twins. He has been following them since his university days when he remembers staying up late to watch the World Series (he suffered from insomnia back then as now). When he was teaching at Ingleburn High School one of his students, a young man named Glenn Williams, was signed by the Atlanta Braves organisation for an enormous amount of money and by 2005 he was playing Major League baseball for the Twins which had a nice circularity to it. Although we weren't leaving the airport it was exciting for Wayne just to be there. The twin cities are also home to the Mall of America, which used to be the largest shopping mall in the world so Meg is not entirely averse to Wayne's desire to one day live in Minnesota.

Domestic flights in the United States are nowhere near as luxurious as the international flights into the country. We were not served any food, nor was there any entertainment in the way of games, music or television. Instead we ended up chatting to some of the other passengers. One man was a current resident of Houston although he had previously lived in multiple other parts of the USA and travelled extensively outside the country. We were able to ask him lots of questions about the area and the sort of places he would recommend us visiting and he made many enquiries about the life we have been living over the previous 18 months. As well we found out that he and his wife are about to have their first child so there was much discussion about children also. The flight itself was just over 2 hours and we had a tail wind so we landed before schedule.

Meg had let Christine know on Facebook that we would be in around 10pm, so our first port of call was to the Baggage Claims area to find out what had happened to our luggage. After a bit of investigation it turned out that, despite the large signs, our luggage had gone onto our original flight from Heathrow to Detroit. It had then been held up there when no one claimed it but was now headed to Houston on a flight that was due in at 10:15 pm. Christine arrived just before 10, so we elected to wait around to pick up the luggage rather than have it couriered out to the house. Lots of catching up was done by the two ladies while we waited then, once the luggage arrived, it was about a half hour drive back to the home of David and Kelly and their five children (Camden, Parker, Lexington, Dallas, Boston and Brittany). By the time we reached our bed we had been up for well over 24 hours and we quickly fell asleep.

Think of us and smile

Well, what a flat out fortnight it has been. Brock and Quinn had their birthdays (on the 12th and 16th of June respectively) which saw us going out for dinner with friends each time and a couple of our colleagues from school coming over for lunch on the Sunday in between. Both boys were happy to receive new mobile phones and to hear from friends and family in various parts of the world.

This period was also the end of Brock’s GCSE exams (sadly, he even had to sit one on the date of his birthday). On Friday June 19th the last of the exams took place. That meant that Prom (the school formal for those of you who are not used to the American term) took place that evening. It was to be held at the school but Brock and many of his friends met beforehand at one girl’s house to catch a limousine. They all looked very different from the way we normally see them during the day, very mature. Brock had a magical night and it was a really positive way for him to end his time at school in the UK.

Saturday saw both boys going out and spending time with various friends for farewells. Neither of them is overly fond of goodbyes so the fact that exams and then the Prom limited the length of time they could take seemed to work in their favour. Quinn even got to go out to a nightclub in Stevenage for a friend’s birthday which saw even other children’s parents expressing their sadness that he was leaving. They have both made a big impact at school and we feel that they have benefited immensely from their experiences.

Sunday morning saw us rising at 7am to make the drive to Heathrow Airport so that the boys could catch their flight to Australia. We anticipated that it would be sad but here things worked out well; with a very quick drive and (after a short initial wait at check-in) being told that it would be about an hour before someone was available to take the boys through customs and onto the plane. We went downstairs to the Arrivals Lounge to have a drink and read. By the time the ‘goodbye’ came the boys had had a chance to look forward to the trip ahead and the delay had left them wanting to get moving. Things moved very quick as the hostess took them through security. Meg and Wayne went back out to the car and made the trip home.

The best word to describe the boy’s trip was ‘eventful’. We will leave it up to them to tell the story in their own words, but for those of you who don’t get to talk to them we will say that it involved measles, flight delays, quarantine and lost baggage. It was lovely to hear that they had arrived safely in Brisbane (and Meg jokes that she has spent more time talking to them since they left than she did in the same period beforehand). While we miss them both it is a nice change to go the fridge and find cheese or to the freezer and find that the ice cube trays are full.

We are not the only staff leaving from school and consequently the last few weeks have been very unsettled. While one or two have places to which they are moving on, others have been, like us, unsure of where we will end up. Some of the students have a parent on the school Governing Board and consequently the news of all these departures leaked out well before anyone had intended. This has led to having unsettled students as well which, in a school like ours, has made things even more difficult that they usually are.

On Wednesday morning we were very excited to receive an email from the principal of Qatar Academy. Wayne had applied for a job there and interviewed for the position but unfortunately not got it. However, the following week a position had looked like becoming available in the Drama Department and he had approached Wayne to see if he would accept this position instead. Sadly, this position did not become available after all and it looked like we would have to be going elsewhere. However, this new email said that a position had become available in the English Department and asked if we would be interested. Upon our positive response we were informed that an offer would be made to us by the end of the week.

Somewhat ironically, on the next day we received a positive response from the American School in Kosova. The idea of going to part of Eastern Europe, which we had not managed to get to during our time in England, was very appealing. If it had come a couple of days earlier then things might have been quite different. As it was, the following morning saw the arrival of the offer from Qatar Academy which included annual return flights to Australia, furnished accommodation, medical and travel insurance, flights to Qatar with an allowance for baggage, and a car allowance. After consultation with Brock and Quinn we accepted.

Consequently, we will be moving to Qatar on September 4th to live and work in an area of Doha (the capital of Qatar) called Education City. Qatar Academy teaches the International Baccalaureate Diploma (probably the best High School qualification in the world). As well as the Academy (where Brock and Quinn will be studying and Wayne teaching) there are six universities; Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar, Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar, Texas A & M University At Qatar, Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar, Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar, and Northwestern University in Qatar. The facilities are wonderful, as is much of the rest of the development going on in Doha. Meg’s intention is to study to complete her teaching qualifications and it will be wonderful for us all to have these opportunities.

As you might have guessed, we are very excited to be continuing on this next leg of our adventure. Thank you once more for all the support we receive from our friends. Emails, letters and phone calls are always so encouraging to receive. If any of you have plans to travel to Qatar give us a bell, if you hadn’t yet thought of doing so let us encourage you to think about it.

(You might like to compare the above photos of Brock and Quinn on the day they left England with this photo taken 2 days after they arrived nearly 18 months ago. Haven't they grown up?)

If it is Wednesday, this must be Milan

There is a legend that has passed into European lore of a group of travellers whose coming heralds the start of the rainy season. No one seems to know when they are coming, but their arrival brings what the Italians call, the ‘aqua vitae’ - the water of life. In Spanish they are said to be from ‘en el marco de’; in Dutch it is ‘omlaag onder’; in Italian their home is ‘sotto terra’. Sometimes their stay might be only for a day, at other times 3 or even 4. They are … the drought breakers.

There is something about deliberately getting up early (as opposed to waking up early and being unable to get back to sleep) which automatically raises a level of excitement. That we were going back to Heathrow for the first time since we had been to Madrid only served to increase this excitement, although not enough to stop one of us from taking an unusually long time in the shower. Still, we were away by 4:45am and the lighter traffic at this time meant that we pulled into the parking at 6am ready for our transfer to the airport.

All of our standard things happened; the boys had no idea where we were going until we checked in, when Brock did find out he had no idea which country Milan was in anyway, and there was trouble with our passports which meant that we had to check in at a counter rather than use Lufthansa’s little self check in booths (to the consternation of the staff who were there to make sure we did use them), Most notable was the woman in the line in front of us who had two over packed suitcases, and another item the size of three fully stuffed bean bags wrapped together in a large amount of clear plastic, which she wanted to take on the plane as carry on baggage (how she would have possibly got this into an overhead locker no one seemed to be entirely sure). She was crying that she was already running late for her plane but, given the baggage situation, the staff was not being overly sympathetic. Other than that we moved rapidly through to Customs.

After the speed of check in, there were only two x-ray machines open at Customs which meant a queue. This would have been more bearable had Meg not had a group of three Manchester United supporters (flying to Portugal for that nights Champions League match) standing behind her. One, in particular, kept pushing Meg, complaining about the length of time it was taking to get through Customs, and making statements along the lines of, ‘this isn’t how we won the war’. Their disgruntlement grew to complete outrage when two things happened simultaneously; a new x-ray machine looked like opening, but was then delayed, and the lady from check in walked completely past the queue and attempted to go straight through the scanner in front of everybody who had been waiting. When Meg heard the people behind referring to a ‘princess’ she thought they might have been talking about her and was ready to open a can of whoop ass upon them. Fortunately (for the Manchester United supporters) at that moment we reached the front of the queue and Wayne was able to explain to whom it was really referring.

One of the comforts of Heathrow which Meg had been anticipating was the presence of a Harrod’s store. Because we had quite a bit of time until our plane was called for boarding we were off to have a look around, then it was an opportunity to browse some more. At this point we noticed the young lady from back at check in, sitting and looking very relaxed. Perhaps unsurprisingly we also saw the Man. United crew sitting at the Weatherspoons pub having a few drinks before boarding the plane. Apparently all the angst wasn’t about catching a flight but about downing a few before doing so. Meg and Brock tried going up to our gate to wait there but were sent back because it was too early.

Eventually the time came to board the aircraft and we were pleasantly surprised. After a few trips travelling with the ultra cheap airlines it was nice to have allocated seats. What was even nicer was that they were quite roomy (both for leg room and side to side) and, of course, they served us some food. Our flight was about an hour and a half, taking us over Geneva, and it seemed that we were very quickly on the ground at Malpensa Airport. Unfortunately, we had to exit the plane down on to the tarmac and then catch a bus to the terminal itself. Quinn was almost the most excited at this point, because although he had been to Italy skiing earlier in the year, this time he was going to get a stamp in his passport. Sure enough, we were through Customs in record time and outside Terminal 1 at Malpensa waiting for the courtesy bus to our hotel.

While checking with a member of staff from where the bus would leave we were referred to ‘the lady over there’ who was going to the Novotel. When we got over to her, although slightly taken aback that people seemed to know where she was going, we were delighted to meet Val from Townsville (the Australian accent was a bit of a give away). She and Meg had a delightful time sharing tips about Milan and about shopping while in Europe generally. Sadly, she and her husband were right at the end of their time in Milan and were off to Florence and Rome before heading across to the UK. Even more amazing, when we first met Val, she was chatting with an American couple. Meg and Wayne don’t know many people who live in the USA, so imagine our surprise when these people turned out to be from Albuquerque, New Mexico, where our friends Christine and Ian and their children live. We were able to chat about their home town before they were taken to their own hotel.

The Novotel Milan Malpensa is actually in the town of Cardano al Campo, only 2 kilometres from Malpensa Airport but at least 35 kilometres from Milan. We checked in to the hotel, took our baggage up to our room and then went back to the lobby to enquire as to where we might best acquire some lunch. Obviously the hotel staff recommended the hotel restaurant, but we were also informed of a restaurant in the forest just a short walk away. It was a beautiful sunny day and a restaurant in the forest sounded like fun, so we decided on the walk. This proved to be a better decision than we could have imagined.

‘Nel “Buco del Mulo’ is a ristorante and pizzeria set in the midst of the Nature Park of Torino, to the north of the town and within easy walking distance of many of the hotels. The lady who seated us spoke excellent English and we felt very welcome from the get go. Meg and the boys ordered pizzas, while Wayne chose a ‘calzone’ (one of his favourite things to eat) and we sat back and waited, chatting about the things we might do in Milan over the next few days. Our drinks came rapidly and the food arrived not long after and we were overwhelmed by the size of the portions and the quality. In particular, Wayne’s calzone was so impressive that he lost it to Meg while the boys both tasted it as well. Brock and Quinn struggled to get through their pizzas and all in all we were very impressed. The waitress was attentive and helpful and we quickly decided that we would be back there again before the end of this trip. If you find yourself in Cardano al Campo and want some really good and inexpensive food, don’t miss the opportunity to dine at ‘Nel “Buco” del Mulo’. We would like to find out if they deliver to the UK.

After lunch we decided to head down into Cardano al Campo (the town is named after a historically significant local family and had the name ‘field’ put at the end by King Vittorio Emanuele II, in 1864, to avoid similarities with other towns in Italy) in order to buy some groceries. As we soon discovered, there were two tiny problems with this plan. The first was that Meg had not changed her shoes with a consequence that, as it was a reasonable distance into the centre of town (and we didn’t take the most direct route) her feet became quite sore. The other thing which we had not counted upon was the fact that everything closes for lunch and siesta around 1pm and doesn’t reopen until 3:30pm. Thus, even when we did find the supermarket it was closed and we were going to have to wait for a while.

Cardano al Campo has a population of 13 800 people, of whom we saw less than 100 during our walk (they take siesta seriously in this part of Italy). There is archaeological evidence of a settlement on the site since Roman times, but the first written reference to the town doesn’t come until the twelfth century. Later it was hit by various plagues which had a serious effect upon the population although the Church of St Peter in the centre of town often provided support. During World War II it was taken by the Germans, but an active resistance was organised among the local townspeople, a number of whom are commemorated in street names. The main street of the town, however, is named Via XX Septembre in commemoration of the date that the Kingdom of Italy captured Rome in 1870. It was on this street that Wayne and Quinn discovered a traffic sign displaying the speed of passing vehicles. Because it also clocked the speed of pedestrians, they had a competition to see who could achieve the fastest speed on the sign. Wayne won with 23 kph to Quinn’s 21.

Once 3:30pm came and various purchases had been made we all set out back to the hotel, this time taking a significantly shorter route. Once back it was decided to go and hang out by the swimming pool. Having been assured that the water was freezing, both Meg and Wayne decided to stay out. Brock and Quinn played a game of table tennis, with the foolish proviso that if the ball went in the pool then Quinn would have to go and get it. While Brock was making every effort to get the ball into the pool, in the end it was Meg who managed it and Quinn ended up swimming. At this point we were informed that the pool was actually closed until next month. As the weather grew cooler we retired to our room, some reading up about what to expect the following day and watching of DVD’s followed before we all drifted off to sleep.

The following morning saw us arise in dribs and drabs before heading down to the restaurant for a buffet breakfast. Having looked out of the window we were dismayed (but not entirely surprised) to see that it was raining. Once again, as in Madrid, we had arrived on a beautiful day only to see it turn cold and wet the following day. We got ready and went downstairs to catch the bus up to Malpensa but missed the first couple that came along. Finally a member of staff gave us a lift in their own car (helpfully providing us with an umbrella when we reached the airport) and then we boarded the shuttle into the city.

We pulled out of Malpensa Terminal 1 at 10am and then back into Terminal 2 at 10:03. Then it was underway into Milan. Initially there was lots of farmland and industry, with turn offs to Torino, Genova and Bologna. As we proceeded down the tollway watching the power lines push off across the largely flat landscape into the distance it, gradually became much more suburban, still flat but broken up by large apartment blocks, church towers, and various industries. We knew we were getting close when we pulled up alongside the San Siro Stadium (the home of both AC Milan and Inter Milan, two of the top football teams in Italy) and passed the home of the Media Conglomerate owned by Sylvio Berlusconi, the Italian President.

At last we drew up alongside the, somewhat misnamed, Milan Central Station. This station is quite a distance from most of the major tourist sites which are largely considered to be the centre of Milan, but is one of the places where the overland line meets the Metro. Rather than put ourselves under the ground and miss some of the sights we decided to walk in toward what all the guidebooks assured us was the highlight of a visit to Madrid, the Duomo. Avoiding the taxis (all white, just to make a contrast to many of the other countries which we have visited) we set off down the Via V. Pisani toward the Piazza della Repubblica which is surrounded by large hotels and mirrors similar Piazza’s in other major Italian cities.

The map which we had brought with us labelled the Giardini Pubblici off the Bastioni di Porta Venezia as being the zoo. Somewhat excited by this we walked into the gardens only to discover that the zoo, as such, doesn’t really exist anymore. The Giardini Pubblici does however feature many, many statues, and we saw quite a significant number of Milanese walking their dogs (which in Meg’s mind became lions, zebra, bears and other assorted animals).

Having quite enjoyed our walk in the park, even if we were a little disappointed at the absence of any real zoo, we next found ourselves at the Galleria d’Arte Moderna. As the rain had started to become heavier no one was really adverse to going in and having a good look. The building itself was designed by architect Leopold Pollak in 1790 and over the years, it became the official residence of Napoleon III and of Marshall Radetzky. In the gallery there was a sizeable collection of paintings and sculptures from 19th-century Italy including works by Appiani, Canova, Hayez, Cremona, Medardo, Rosso, Ranzoni and Segantini. One of the most impressive things was a collection of tiny miniatures which showed amazing detail. Despite some misdirection by the guides, and a sense that we were a little underdressed, it was a very interesting time.

Emerging from the Galleria we found that the rain had lightened off a little and as we set off down the road we noticed what looked like a Museum down the next street, the Corso Venezia. As it turned out, this was the Museo di Storia Naturale which was founded in 1838 when a young man, Giuseppe de Cristoforis (1803–1837), died donating his collections to the city. It has just a fabulous collection of skeletons, dioramas and stuffed animals displayed in really interesting ways (although just a tad more English would have helped). We had a drink in the café on the top floor first, where Wayne managed to make friends with a young child (she was apparently teaching Wayne how to put his fist in his mouth and found it hilarious when he attempted it) before looking through the museum itself.

As we were leaving the building after an excellent visit (well worth the €6 it cost us), the front entrance was extraordinarily crowded with teenagers. It was only as we squeezed out of the doors that we realised that this was because the rain had got even heavier. At this point Wayne became geographically challenged and started heading toward the Viale Majno, rather than in the opposite direction, which did two things; firstly, it made him grumpy, wet and cold, and secondly, it allowed us to see some of the most beautiful buildings we had yet seen. The apartments in this area of Milan were tall and elegant and through wrought iron gates we could glimpse gorgeous internal courtyards. One of the buildings was covered with creepers which have obviously been climbing for a long time.

After some misdirection, an aborted attempt to catch a bus, and Wayne being completely unreasonable, we finally found ourselves walking through the Corso Victor Emmanuele II and up to the Duomo il Milano. If you have never seen it then it is hard to describe the magnificence of this cathedral. We were approaching it in the rain, from the back (where scaffolding was obstructing some of the view) and with Wayne struggling to overcome his own frustration with himself, and yet all of us were amazed at just how impressive a construction it is. Mark Twain [in Innocents Abroad] wrote of it,

“What a wonder it is! So grand, so solemn, so vast! And yet so delicate, so airy, so graceful! A very world of solid weight, and yet it seems ...a delusion of frostwork that might vanish with a breath!... The central one of its five great doors is bordered with a bas-relief of birds and fruits and beasts and insects, which have been so ingeniously carved out of the marble that they seem like living creatures-- and the figures are so numerous and the design so complex, that one might study it a week without exhausting its interest...everywhere that a niche or a perch can be found about the enormous building, from summit to base, there is a marble statue, and every statue is a study in itself...Away above, on the lofty roof, rank on rank of carved and fretted spires spring high in the air, and through their rich tracery one sees the sky beyond. ... (Up on) the roof...springing from its broad marble flagstones, were the long files of spires, looking very tall close at hand, but diminishing in the distance...We could see, now, that the statue on the top of each was the size of a large man, though they all looked like dolls from the street... They say that the Cathedral of Milan is second only to St. Peter's at Rome. I cannot understand how it can be second to anything made by human hands.”

These days it is only the third largest cathedral in Christendom (as they say) with one in Seville having surpassed this one, however that does not detract from Twain’s words. We spent perhaps an hour inside, with all agreeing that it could have been a week and we still would not have seen everything there was to see. Despite the commotion outside in the square, and the number of people actually in the Duomo itself, it was tranquil and serene. There is the option to pay some money and catch the lift up to the roof but we opted not to. Instead, knowing that we would be back again during our stay in Milan, we headed back outside.

At last the rain had started to lighten, which was handy for the crowds packed into the square staring up at the balcony on one of the nearby buildings. We discovered that some famous pop star (or model, or actress, they all seem to be interchangable these days) was being interviewed by the Italian MTV with the square forming the background. Consequently, Brock and Quinn have now appeared live on Italian MTV (we could see the telecast on the enormous television which stood on the other side of the square). After looking around some more and being amazed at the number of stalls which filled the walkways around the square (let alone the shopping opportunities which completely surrounded us in the buildings) we adjourned to McDonalds for a traditional lunch/dinner knowing that we would only have a light supper when we arrived back in Cardano al Campo.

To make our trip back to the railway station just a little easier we caught the City Sightseeing bus (at a significantly reduced rate, thanks to the guide) which was also a good preparation for one of the things we had planned to do the next day. It gave us both an opportunity to see where some of the sights we would visit the next day were, and also demonstrated where the stop closest to the station was, as well as providing a timetable so that we would be able to catch it. Now that the rain had subsided it was much easier to view lots of the things around the station and we were able to grab some drinks from a local supermarket before reboarding the shuttle bus back to Malpensa.

All that remained was a quick transfer at the airport from the shuttle bus down to where we had met the courtesy bus back to the Novotel. At this point our major problem with the hotel emerged, as yet again we had trouble catching the courtesy bus. It arrived three times, with the first two seeing the driver resfusing to take us on. There was some confusion about whether there was another Novotel near the airport (there isn’t but there is one near Linate [the other airport] and another in the city itself). The next time he appeared we insisted that we get on the bus and took the journey back. By this time Meg was fuming and made her feelings about the situation very clear to the staff at reception. Then Wayne and Meg headed up to the room to remove wet clothes and have showers, while the boys went downstairs and spent time on the computers that were provided in the foyer. When they returned after their allocated 20 minutes we all had some cheese and crackers. Then, feeling significantly more tired than we had the previous evening (and the boys had slept on the shuttle bus on the way back) we all retired for the night, hoping that the weather on the following day would be an improvement.

NB. The ‘drought breakers’ from Down Under are available to visit you. All you need to do is pay for our flights and we can be with you to bring the rains almost anywhere in the world.

The rain in Spain...

Since we arrived in the UK back in January we have not boarded another aeroplane, so we were all very excited as we got into Kylie to head to Heathrow. We had already booked her into a parking station near the airport, so we figured that, if we left around 6am we should have plenty of time to get the 48.7 miles to the parking station and be dropped at the airport to have some breakfast before the flight. Indeed, Meg was worried about how we would kill the time till our flight left at 9:20am. When we were still sitting, stationary, on the M25 at 8:10am these thoughts had turned from how we would kill time, to whether we would even make the plane.

We finally pulled into the parking station, leaving the keys in Kylie so the parking attendants could take her to her home for the next few days, and rushed with our bags to the minibus at 8:40am. Waiting the next five minutes for the minibus to load and depart was almost unbearable, every second bringing us closer to the point of no return. Only Wayne, who had been particularly stressed throughout the drive, felt more relaxed during this point, knowing that it was out of his hands. Fortunately, our driver was very good and we reached Terminal 1 at 9:02am.

It was at this moment that we were incredibly thankful for the internet and Meg’s decision to check us in to our flight the night before. With the help of British Airways wonderful staff we made the sudden decision to carry on all our baggage, which meant that, as we swept through customs, we had to abandon such things as deodorants at the airport. With a further run the final mile or so to the most distant gate in the terminal, we found ourselves, out of breath and more than a little stressed, in the queue to board the aircraft, with even a few stragglers behind us.

Brock and Quinn had only discovered our destination when we had to explain it to the BA staff as we checked in, so they were very excited looking out of the window. Not far in to the flight Brock asked if we had reached Ireland yet, which raised once more the question of what they actually do learn in Geography at schools. As we flew over France and the Bay of Biscay we lamented the absence of Google Earth which would have allowed us to identify exactly where we were. Our next sighting of land beneath us (somewhat delayed by the cloud over the Pyrenees and out into the Bay) was the brownish uplands of Northern Spain’s Castilla y Leon.

Heading south we saw many fascinating things; enormous lines of wind turbines; valleys carved out by rivers over centuries obviously having found weaknesses in the rocks and earth; tunnels going under hills and emerging on the other side; what looked like an enormous compound; and a wonderful dam north of Madrid. Barajas Airport is about 30klm to the west of Central Madrid but the pilot avoided the city and brought us in without having seen much of Madrid at all.

We were all amazed by just how large and beautiful the airport itself was. Gleaming marble floors, fabulous ergonomic and audio friendly ceilings, and (which we would discover was very typical of Madrid) lots and lots of public art. As we were making our way along one of the many travellators (they were extensive) we spotted a man dressed as a matador, he may even have been one, but without asking how can you tell? Stamps in our passport, a quick train journey to the main section of the airport and we really felt like we were on the ground in Spain.

Meg asked at multiple information desks to determine the best (and most cost effective) way to get to our hotel. A taxi would have cost approximately 100€. The airport bus was somewhere in the region of 60€. Alternatively, the Metro (Madrid’s public train system) as going to cost us 2€ each. Consequently, we went down to the platform and caught the train to Nuevos Ministerios, changed lines to go to Alonso Martinez, then one more change to get to Chueca. We would highly recommend the Metro in Madrid; it was fast and efficient (we got off one train, walked to the next platform and straight on to the next train each time), it was incredibly clean (no old food wrappers or discarded newspapers as there are in Australia and England) and brilliantly cheap. Despite a warning Meg had read about crime, there was no hint of it here and everyone we met or stood next to was exceedingly polite.

We had found our hotel on the internet and it looked beautiful. Chueca is an older suburb of Madrid only minutes to the north of the centre of the old city. One thing we had not discovered from our research was another aspect of the nature of Chueca. Emerging from the subway we found a newsagent whose owner spoke rudimentary English and were able to acquire a map of the area. It was only a couple of blocks to walk and during that journey we encountered the Venereal Disease Clinic, the Transgender Association, the Gay and Lesbian Travel Agency, and (right opposite our hostel) an enormous sex shop specialising in play toys. Glancing at our map again (and some of the advertising around the outside turned out to be quite graphic) we used our elementary Spanish to discover that Chueca is the gay and lesbian neighbourhood of Madrid.

As it turned out our hostel was in a fabulous spot just over a block from Gran Via, an ornate and upscale shopping street located in central Madrid. It is only a couple of blocks from the Plaza de Espana, the Plaza del Callao and the Plaza de la Puerta del Sol and not far from the main routes that the tour buses use. However, it was up 6 flights of fabulous wooden stairs which had worn down in places after hundreds of years of traffic up and down. When we reached the top and walked through the door into the hostel foyer Meg, Wayne and Brock all had the same reaction. Glancing past the reception desk into the bedroom beyond (which would turn out to be Meg and Wayne’s) we noticed the blood red walls, the shagpile heart shaped mat, the three large plastic flower shaped lights over the bedhead, and wanted to withdraw apologising that we had come to the wrong place.

After ascertaining that it was the hostel we had booked (although Meg and Wayne were later convinced that the next door room was being hired out by the hour) we adjourned to our rooms for a couple of hours rest before making our first (unencumbered by baggage) trip out on to the streets of Madrid. Like the metro, one of the first things that you notice about Madrid is the absence of litter. The place is amazingly clean, at least around where we were staying. The next thing is a proliferation of dogs. Over the next few days we were to encounter an enormous number of dogs ranging from very cute to happily mongrel. Most noticeable along the Gran Via is the extraordinary architecture (something for which the street is justifiably famous). Being the shopping hub of Madrid, Meg also had a great time checking out various stores, particularly the number of fine handbag shops.

One of the first sights that we came across after stepping out on to the Gran Via was McDonalds. This in itself wasn’t surprising, although the boys decided they wanted to eat there for dinner (when Meg and Wayne foolishly offered them the choice) but there were two features of the store which were. The first of these was the amazing early twentieth century architecture of the building itself; this has to be one of the most beautiful McDonalds buildings on the planet. The second thing was that McDonalds (and the Calle de la Montera which runs down beside it) had the outside of the building lined with prostitutes. On this day, where the temperature was a balmy 25, as opposed to the 12 degrees back in Hertfordshire, they were all dressed appropriately and we hurried the boys along past.

After spending a couple of hours window shopping, admiring the amazing statuery on the top of buildings, eating, and trying out some conversational Spanish (we had contemplated going to a movie until we discovered that, rather than being subtitled, they had been dubbed into Spanish) we decided to retire for the evening. We made our way back to the hostel, looking forward to being able to stroll around in the sunshine for an entire day and sit atop the red double decker tourist buses listening to the commentary as we got to know some more about Madrid. After laughing at a partial episode of ‘The Simpsons’ (which had also been dubbed into Spanish) we discovered that our televisions both showed BBC World News and CNN in English and drifted off to sleep after catching up with what was happening around the world.

The next morning dawned somewhat faster than we had hoped due to a couple of interesting circumstances which affected our hostel. One was that the burgeoning nightclub scene in Chueca really kicked off around midnight, seemingly under Wayne and Meg’s hostel room window. The other was that when people came to the top of the stairs looking for the use of a room for a short period they rung a buzzer which was clearly heard throughout the building. Amazingly, Brock and Quinn (who admitted the following morning to having stayed up until 1am) missed much of this. When we all stumbled out to breakfast it was with the knowledge that the weather had also changed overnight. It was now cold (a top of only 8 degrees) and wet, very very wet.

Having packed little else (and being optimistic by nature) we hastily put on our summer clothes hoping that the weather would clear during the day. We then ventured down and out on to the street to the ticket office for the tour bus. Strangely, when we walked up to the desk the attendant was discussing something with another customer. We can only assume that this was a topic of great importance, because the conversation lasted at least 10 minutes while we waited, with no sign of ever being completed. Because the boys and Meg are exceptionally patient by nature (sarcasm is intended at this point) we left and went further up the Gran Via hoping to catch the bus at the next stop. Even these hopes were somewhat confounded when the next bus to pull up proved to be completely full.

After waiting a while longer we finally made it on to the next bus (with the help of a French couple who communicated with us in Spanish that was almost as bad as ours) but we could not sit on the top level because the rain was so heavy and there was no cover at all up there. It is extremely doubtful that Meg would have ventured upstairs even if the top section had been open, given the coldness of the day. We plugged our earphones in to listen to the commentary and sat back to take in the Madrid we had been so looking forward to. Sadly, with the number of people on the bus and the state of the weather outside all of the windows quickly fogged up. As well, it turned out that the bus had a leak, over Meg’s seat, and Wayne had to sit with his arms wrapped tightly around her in order to keep her even barely warm. To finish off the picture, imagine a tour guide who informs you as to where you are by pushing a button which sets off the next piece of the pre-recorded commentary. Then envisage this tour guide only pushing that button after we had passed the thing being commentated upon. This will give you an accurate picture of our experience over the next few hours.

We sat through the Old Madrid version of the tour (there are two options in Madrid because of the size of the city and the enormous changes which have taken place over the centuries) twice. By the second time Meg seriously needed to visit a restroom as did Quinn. We noticed that we were approaching the Plaza Mayor, which Meg had envisioned as a sort of covered mall because of the descriptions provided in slightly broken English by various locals with which we had conversed., so we exited the tour bus. On the ground it became apparent that, instead Plaza Mayor is an open quadrangle with shops beside a path around the interior. Wayne also pointed out at this moment something which, upon reflection he recognises might have been better mentioned at an earlier stage. Madrid does not have public toilets! If you need to go, you need to buy something from a provendor whose estabishment contains a bathroom.

Bizarrely, the place in which we chose to eat so that most of the family (by now Brock also needed to go) could go to the bathroom was a Ben and Jerry’s Icecream parlour. Four Australians, living in England, on holidays in supposedly sunny Spain, were in a shop specialising in American icecream. This is not the limit of their merchandise however, they also sold what Meg has since described as the ‘best hot chocolate’ she has ever tasted. Some of this may be attributed to the fact that she was using her cup to warm her hands, which by this stage were nearly as blue as her feet. The lady behind the counter in the store spoke very good English and she found our stories and our complaints incredibly funny. She ushered us out the door, once it was clear that we were not going to purchase anything more, with hearty good wishes as to the rest of our stay.

Plaza Mayor means ‘Main Square’, and it has been called this since the start of the 16th century. The buildings around the square were inaugurated in 1620, giving Madrid a large, rectangular, stone-paved plaza with ground floor arcades. In 1853 it was remodelled by Juan de Villanueva. Until the last century, the Plaza Mayor was used as a marketplace on weekdays and was the scene of popular events from bullfights to public announcement of sentences during the Inquisition, religious processions, public executions and dance and theatre festivals. On Sunday mornings there is still a stamp market held beneath the arches, and during the Christmas holidays numerous stalls offer all types of Christmas decorations for sale. Christmas markets are a tradition in Europe and this knowledge may well bring us back to see Madrid again at a time closer to the holidays.

The symbol of Madrid is a bear standing upright with its front paws against a strawberry tree (we know, as do the people of Madrid, that strawberries do not grow on trees, but the flowers are strawberry shaped, hence the name). Both the tree and the bear used to be native to the area, however nowadays you tend to see some of the former but none of the latter in the wild. There is a statue of the symbol which is quite a famous part of Madrid and we longed to see it. What we didn’t realise at this point was that the statue was in a square not far from the Plaza Mayor, only a very short walk from where we were. Instead of looking at it, we walked to the next tour bus stop, where Wayne stood, looking back down the street, and reserved us a place in the line while the boys and Meg waited under some shelter.

Eventually another red bus picked us up from the front of the Plaza Mayor and we journeyed the relatively short distance to the point where the two tours overlap. This is one of the wonderful things about these sorts of tour, you can get on and off wherever you wish. In Madrid the one ticket covers both tour options and we purchased a pass for two days which meant that we could travel around and around Madrid for as long as we wished, getting off and then back on again whenever the mood took us. However, on this day the weather was so cold that the mood struck very very rarely. The one consolation in all of this, which we discovered later, was that back at home in Hertford it was even colder, so cold indeed that we had a number of inches of snow fall on the school where we live.

The changeover point was outside one of the major museums in Madrid, the Museo del Prado. This has the reputation of being one of the finest museums in the world and contains the best collection of classical art in Madrid. El Greco, Goya, Velazquez and Caravaggio are all represented there and, while we were in Madrid, there was also a touring display of some of Rembrandts more famous paintings. If we needed more convincing about the love of art that the people of Madrid have, then the fact that the queue for the exhibition snaked well out of the building down the long pathway at the front and out on to the street, on a day when it was cold, wet and squally would have done so. Meg and Wayne like to think that it was the length of the queue that kept us out, rather than the boys frequently expressed antipathy toward museums.

Travelling up the Caseo de la Castellana presented somewhat of a contrast, much as you might expect from the names of the two tours. While there was still some old fashioned architecture in this part of Madrid, there was a lot more which tended toward the modern. The street was extended during the 1950’s and therefore many of the buildings are from this period. Perhaps the most striking of these are the Puerto de Europa Towers, two 115 metre tall buildings built in 1996 by the Kuwait investments office (hmm, wonder why Spain went on to support the US against Iraq?). These were designed by the Americans Philip Johnson and John Burgee and they stand at an incline of 15 degrees to the vertical. When Meg first saw them she worried that she was seeing things.

Another impressive building is the Torres de Madrid. This is Spain’s tallest building and also one of the newest, having only been completed in the middle of this year. The architect who designed the Twin Towers designed a different building not far from this, and this also provoked some wry comments from people sitting on the bus. There is a sense that the Madrid bombings of March 11, 2004 have had a serious impact upon the city (there is a magnificent memorial park to the victims) but they will not let it hold them back.

This leg of the tour makes a turn before you reach the business district proper (where, for example, the Puerto de Europa towers actually stand) past another of Madrid’s most famous landmarks. The Bernabeu stadium, home of Real Madrid (one of the most famous sporting teams in the world) is just here. Wayne was very excited to see it and would have jumped out to do a tour then and there. However, the fact that it was raining quite heavily and we would be back doing this round trip again the following day convinced him that it was better to wait. It is a huge stadium, seating 80 000 people in a way that keeps them very close to the players and the ground. Attending a match there would be a phenomenal experience and much cheaper than attending similar games in England.

It was the upmarket shopping area of Madrid that occupied much of the second half of this tour. If a famous designer label wants to test a market in Spain, it is apparently to here that they come. You name a famous design label, they were represented here. It is also the area in which one finds many of the consulates and embassies in Madrid. We spotted a number of them (not the Australian sadly) with the most notable being the American Embassy. This was partially on account of the sheer scale of the building, the height of the walls etc.; partly it was the tank that sat outside.

After the completion of this leg, as we motored back down toward the Museo del Prado and the beautiful statue of Neptune which sits in the centre of the roundabout nearby, we had to make the decision as to what to do next. It did not seem that the weather was likely to ease this evening, and we were convinced that at night it would be even colder on the buses, a situation for which we were clearly not prepared. Consequently, it was decided to change buses once more and head back to the hostel for some dinner and some warmth. The walk back through the streets saw various body parts turn blue, but our hostel was warm and snug, and as we drifted off to sleep watching BBC and CNN we hoped that the next day would bring some sunshine.