Postcards from the Edge.

INRODUCTION: Camille has asked me to post pictorial accounts of my travels from time to time in the form of a travelogue. Here is my first attempt. I have deliberately not named where I was or my destination so those who wish to tackle this as a quiz may do so.

I was getting irritated. Or as we say in Yorkshire, I wasn’t feeling best pleased. My new business partner was on the other end of the phone with an unexpected early morning call.
‘You said our client would meet me here in his bloody office,’ I repeated sounding as exasperated as I could; having been dragged out the hotel restaurant half way through my breakfast.
‘Well now he wants to meet you at his bloody house,’ replied my partner clearly bored with the conversation.
‘Yes but he lives on a feckin island! I responded. ‘How the f**k am I going to get there?’
The receptionist clearly unaccustomed to English business terminology, put down her papers to listen, while absent-mindedly chewing the end of her pencil.
‘I knew that someone from one of the world’s top universities would come in useful one day,’ my partner responded dryly. ‘But those of us without the benefit of your education usually resort to boats.’
I slammed the phone down and looked at the receptionist who blushed furiously and began to shuffle her papers again. Pausing she looked up.
‘You’ve got twenty minutes to catch the boat,’ she offered far too smugly for my liking, pointing towards the door.

I grabbed my kit and began to run. ‘Bollocks!’ I muttered under my breath. I had hoped to get some retail therapy in before my meeting. Now I had to visit some God-forsaken, olive-oil gargling, lemons-up-your-jacksie island. My carefully planned schedule for the day had now gone totally to pot. I had also set my heart on getting some photos of the city’s infamous mountains of rubbish that were blocking the roads. Unbelievably, here the rubbish disposal is controlled by the Mafia, a curious local custom that inspired the American soap ‘The Sopranos.’ According to the hotel manager the local mafia were no ordinary Sicilian thugs, but none other than the dreaded Camora. The Camorristi are said to be the most brutal of all the different flavours of Mafiosi, who make Alan Capone look like everyone’s favourite uncle.


Thanks to the laws of physics it was all downhill to the harbour and I ran as best I could with my less than sensible sandals and camera bag. Trouble was the harbour was full of boats – zillions of them with no clue as to which was mine, another inconvenience which did little to salve my mood.


Reaching the quayside I paused to get my breath back. As I looked around it was good to know I was at least in a land where people were limited in the abuse they could mete out to our canine friends. Grateful that there were some semblances of civilization, I headed towards where the ferries seemed to be congregated.

Eventually by talking slowly and loudly (the best way to engage foreigners) I found the ticket office. Minutes later, ticket in hand I discovered my boat in accordance with Sod’s Law was casting off. I could have waited another hour, but I really wasn’t in the mood. Hanging onto my hat I gritted my teeth and running like hell jumped. Lapping lazily below me the heaving ‘snot-green, scrotum-tightening sea,’ as Joyce was wont to call it. Thankful I had no bits to tighten, I seemed airborne for ages. As I was meeting a client I had opted for a summer skirt instead of my beloved cargoes, and to exacerbate matters the hem was billowing skywards, making my choice of shreddies a matter of public scrutiny. Foam and a thick plume of black smoke were already spewing alarmingly from the blunt end of the boat. I grabbed desperately for the rail with one hand, while trying to control my skirt with the other. Fleetingly I panicked, then a sailor grabbed me. Far too indecently I might add and after being enveloped in a fog of garlic and having a hand the size of a dustbin lid planted on my semi-naked arse I was ushered into the packed lounge.

Heart still pounding, I looked around to discover there were only two seats left. One in the middle of a gaggle of noisy American housewives from Seattle wearing enough lipstick to circumscribe the earth twice and the other with what looked like a busload of ex-cons, rapists, child-molesters and burglars. On reflection it was a no-brainer. I dumped down with the men. My fellow travellers all appeared strangers to shaving and I didn’t need hypersensitive olfactory organs to divine they weren’t regular deodorant users either.

‘Swedish?’ One asked in broken English, as I stowed my camera bag under my legs.
‘English!’ I replied, letting my head loll on one side and my tongue flop out. Looking simple is far harder than one might imagine and they were having none of it. I plugged my i-pod in and gazed at the flat screen on the baulkhead which was showing a game show. By my calculation the journey was just over an hour. I groaned inwardly.

‘English girl are beautiful,’ one opined using both his oil-stained hands to model a chunk of air into the shape of an hour glass. Grinning lasciviously his tongue flicked out to remove a fleck of spittle from the corner of his scarred mouth. I could only assume he’d had an accident with a beer bottle. The far side of the lounge one of the Seattle women silenced the steady throb of diesels with a laugh that would have made an Aberdeen fisherwoman blush, confirming my choice of the burglars and rapists was a good call. The rest of the lounge was occupied by expressionless Japanese, with most the women wearing white gloves. Maybe they were all radioactive? I wondered why they never appeared happy on holiday. Perhaps the ones who were wearing face-masks were smiling underneath?

‘Scusarsi’ I was being nudged in the ribs. As I wasn’t going to get any peace I removed my ear phones, and listened while my new companions explained I shouldn’t buy anything on the island, as it was the ‘most expensive shopping in the world.’ Writing on what looked like the back page of Condom Weekly, another guy explained where I should take lunch and who sold the best ice-cream. Like all men they were pussycats really and I settled back to note with some mirth that the guy next to me had what looked like fresh scrambled egg lodged in his stubble.


The journey passed more quickly than I could have imagined and soon were nosing into the bustling little harbour.

Minutes later we were scrambling from the boat. My new friends explained my destination the Piazza Umberto I, known locally as La Piazzetta was at the top of the mountain. The narrow quayside was already a heaving mass of humanity as anxious holiday-makers jostled for position. Scything through them like Boadicia’s army, chopping off ankles left, right and centre, the masked and gloved Japanese dragging their voluminous wheeled suitcases, while retreating in disorder more timorous holidaymakers looked as though they might teeter into the harbour. I decided to let the melee clear, but my Mafiosi friends would have none of it. They grasped my elbow and explained I needed the funicolare. My mother had warned me about foreigners and I was equally adamant I didn’t want any funicolare with anybody. But to no avail, flanked front, rear and sides by my minders, we advanced in phalanx through the holidaymakers putting them to rout, driving the now terrified Japanese in disarray before us at a speed that even General Douglas MacArthur would have found impressive.


Luckily the funicolare turned out to be little more than a quaint funicular railway. After being bundled onto the little train I looked on apologetically as some Australian backpackers were told by my escorts use another compartment. Despite this, I still felt guilty as I explained to my new friends that in England we only shook hands on parting. However, in the best European tradition we compromised and they took it in turns to kiss my hand. Then with them singing ‘Return to Sorrento’ and me wiping my hand on the back of my skirt, the little train set off with a spine-snapping jerk. Soon we were climbing rapidly through scented lemon groves clinging to the hillside. If any readers have an Italian friend do get them to whisper fu-nic-o-la-re a couple of times in your ear – the Italian ability to savour and linger on each syllable is almost orgasmic. However, beware it’s the kind of word that could get you into bed.

At the top, blocking my way out the station was a group of Englishwomen. From their accents they sounded like girls from a minor public school in Surrey accompanied by their over-aspirational mothers. I cringed and hung a quick left to avoid them, there being nothing worse than Englishwomen on holiday.
‘I say!’ One of the mothers was looking directly at me, her intonation redolent of a donkey having a dry rectal examination. ‘I say!’ she repeated. ‘Do you know where Gracie Fields lived? You are English?’
‘Нет! Я – русский’ I replied, lending a sardonic scowl to my mouth. It worked and I escaped into the heaving throng of holidaymakers.


My instructions were to wait under the clock tower and look ‘English’. However, I was ten minutes early, so I decided to hunt down some local talent for the Blog.



Spotting a cute brunet with extremely kissable lips I enquired if I could take her photograph and she blushingly obliged. For an all too brief ten seconds it seemed we were succumbing to the same squishy feeling, then wishing I could have stayed for second helpings of Entente Cordiale I reluctantly shuffled off to look for a matching blonde in the interests of journalistic balance – Jaye always insists on at least one blonde.


Girls with cameras are always great favourites of mine, so I hastily scanned the throng. Click! I spotted a willowy blonde with a cute hat. This should satisfy Judy I decided. I was just checking the image when somebody grabbed my elbow.

‘Prego! Scusarsi - per favore’ I turned to find an earnest young man with unnaturally white teeth smiling at me. Oddly he didn’t sound in the slightest bit American. Prego? Ok so I’m developing love handles but prego? Before I could gather my composure he was manoeuvring me through the melee, I relaxed thinking perhaps there had been a change in plan. The man who was coming to meet me was supposed to have had a walrus moustache. Perhaps he had shaved it off?

Ahead were a group of people who laughingly masquerade as the media, but are more aptly known as the gutter-press or Paparazzi. The guy obviously thought I was one of them! This clearly was not my day. First a missed breakfast and now this! As I began to construct a phrase conjoining elements of sex and travel, he pointed towards a couple who were posing for photographs.


I had no idea who they were, although they looked suspiciously like porn stars. I rattled off a frame to show willing and then looked to escape. Maybe I was just jealous that my leather trousers at home no longer fitted like hers?


Spotting me the woman insisted I stayed to photograph her in profile flaunting her Dior shades. I rattled off another hasty frame and escaped into the melee.


If I thought I was incognito it didn’t last long. One of the locals spotted me and hastily adjusted her make-up. I half expected her to run off into the crowd screaming: ‘It’s that woman from the Girls’ Coffee Shop!’ but instead she smiled dreamily at me as if trying to remember her name.


Worse was to come, it seemed walrus moustaches were a local fashion –well at least for the men. There were a least half a dozen in sight. However, minutes later with a sigh of relief I spotted my man, who was just as described. He leered respectfully (a talent many men never acquire) and after mentally undressing me decided I was the Englishwoman he had been expecting.

(to be continued)