You Men!

I flew into Zürich early in the morning. The flight from London was on time and the captain apologised and gave us some chocolates!

What happened was, once we were airborne the captain of the flight announced that the weather was excellent and we would be landing at Zürich twenty minutes ahead of schedule. However, as we neared Zürich, a ground fog crept in on the airport and hence there was a delay. With that delay, we landed on time. Still the captain sent large chocolates with his compliments, to all the passengers.

Once I reached the hotel where I was booked, I started the check in process and entered the customary details such as Name, Nationality, passport no. and then the date. I entered 22-10-1985. I then recalled that that was my birthday!

I knew that I would be in Zürich on my birthday but, the tensions of international travel had made me forget it, so early in the morning.

As I wrote it down I remarked to the dignified looking matronly receptionist, “Oh! I had forgotten. Today is my birthday.”

I must have triggered something deep inside her. Her shoulders sagged. She glared at me and the look was transformed to a look of pity and she said “Oh, you men, howwww cannnnn you forget your own birthdays. I can never understand this.” She shook her head pityingly and stared at an imaginary point, above my head, far away.

And then suddenly duty beckoned. She straightened up, forced a smile back to her face and shook me by the hand and wished me a happy birthday and a pleasant stay in Zürich.

I did have a great time except for a small hitch, which was also a pleasant incident, as the next post shows.

Silence

I landed in Heathrow and passed through immigration without a hitch and came out. I was supposed to catch a coach (aka bus) to Euston station and then catch a train to Staffordshire. I found my way to the bus stand just outside the terminal and boarded the bus.

Everything was strange. Whatever I had read and heard about England had not prepared me enough for the place. I was looking for something familiar. What I found was a factory of Brylcream! Unbelievably, the sight comforted me that I was not on an alien planet.

I started observing things around me - the seats of the bus, the glasses of it windows, the very few people on the bus…. In spite of all these things, I was feeling ill at ease. I was wondering what it was. Then I realised that it was the silence.

By this time, the bus had moved from the airport area outside the city to the city proper. There was a fair amount of traffic but no sounds. I had had problems with my ears on the aircraft thanks to the compression and decompression. I panicked as I thought that it had really affected my hearing. Then I tried to sort things out by listening to sounds that I was able to hear and estimate the extent of the damage. To my surprise I could hear the sounds within the bus. I could hear sounds such as the whirr of the blower of the air heater and the noise from the engine located outside the bus at the back. That meant that my hearing was functioning. Ah, that was a relief.

But then why was I not hearing any of the traffic noise - engine noises and horns being honked. Then it dawned on me that I could not hear all those things because there were no such noises.

Being accustomed to the noise of the then ubiquitous Ambassador cars and the incessant honking in India, I was not prepared for the silent traffic of London.

I stayed in England for three months and heard the horn being used only once. A very young cyclist rode on the wrong side of the road and came close to being run over by a car driven by an old man. The old man honked angrily and screamed at the boy – “you will kill yourself!”

That is it, for three months.

PS. I heard that there was a "hornless" day in Bombay recently. Wonder how successful it was. Please let me know, if you do.