pedestrian thoughts

I live in West London, under Heathrow airport’s flightpath. My local London underground station is on the same line as Heathrow airport, about 25 minutes away. I’ve flown from Heathrow before. It’s fine. You can even take two bits of hand-baggage from there. But not from Gatwick. Which is where I flew from.

So, with both my camera kit and laptop thrown into the same rucksack as reading materials, tickets, Passport, and other in-flight necessities (from either the airline’s perspective or mine, but seldom both), I set off, somewhat intrepidly, on my trip. At 5am. Now, it’s not that intrepidity stems from tiredness, you understand, but it should probably be noted that I’d spent the previous afternoon and evening watching a game of association football and drinking moderately, at a den of obscene iniquity, and questionable integrity, somewhere in London’s dangerous (but nevertheless trendy) Clapham. And didn’t go to bed afterwards.

Cab arrives ten minutes early than anticipated. I’m sort of ready, but decide to keep him waiting outside until 5am - which is when I’d booked the car for. Atonement was swift; as I was chucking my case in the boot, his dirty rear bumper and tailgate soiled my jeans. Not the best thing, really, when you’re about to make an 8,000 mile round-trip and need live off only two pairs of jeans (the aforementioned, newly soiled, ones being the best-fitting and most comfortable of the two) for the next week. So, foul mood in the taxi. Made even fouler by having to endure a tragic, mushy-music, radio station for the 9 mile journey to Victoria. It was one of those rare occasions that I felt the need to actually update my facebook status with details of what I was doing and how I was feeling, rather than a slightly obscure song lyric or bizarre film reference (although I maintain the sentiment of the previous update, which is that milk was a bad choice, was a salient point that needed making).

Got on the Gatwick Express. It’s completely unremarkable. Apart from the very bright lighting in the carriages. So that’d be almost completely unremarkable, then.

Gatwick’s North Terminal was my next point of call. Breezed through check-in and security, following a swift ‘Big Breakfast’ (no sausage, but an extra hash brown instead, please) under the golden arches. Couldn’t find any wireless Internet for love, only for an extortionate amount of money. Decided to slum it and use the Internet on my mobile for nothing. Didn’t go for a pint in one of the two departure lounge pubs. Rang mum instead.

So. Delta. An American airline, playing a non-variety of pop-country music while you board. And, according to the seat-back magazine, you can download the very playlists they heroically craft from the iTunes Music Store. Just search for ‘delta tunes’ on the iMix page. Seriously.

The most surreal part of the flight came with the captain’s welcoming announcement, performed spectacularly in a good old country boy American accent: a higher body had decreed that only business class passengers can make use of the first class lavatories - and that only standard class passengers can go for a piss in the plebs’ bogs. It was also pointed out that members of any congregations would be ‘dispersed’, in accordance with Transport Security Agency guidelines. Thankfully, it was a very lightly loaded 767-300ER flight (around a third full). The two toilets serving the whole of coach started to appear a bit ‘fresh’ by the time we’d got over Canada; the mind worries for their state at the end of a fully-laden flight, and about the level of queuing that would ensue. 130:1 lavatory contention can’t be an altogether good thing, especially considering the potential for queue-jumping brought about by the crowd dispersal policy.

Delta feed you good. Let’s get that straight. Peanuts and a drink just after take-off, a full tray meal about an hour in (with free booze), ice cream half way there, and the bizarre combination of a pizza slice and shortbread biscuit just before descent. Plus, it seemed, as much tea as you could possibly gulp down your gullet. Being a Yorkshireman, and possessing an unabashed inability to reject the offer of a cuppa, meant I took on one of the less desirable aspects of a racehorse for much of the morning. It’s a diuretic, don’t you know.

Fast forward the reasonable flight, dull plod through JFK’s shoddy terminal 2, and the uneventful AirTrain ride to Jamaica. Bring on that first Subway ride of the trip. Always a bit of a dodgy one; armed with a suitcase, a backpack, and a copy of Time Out’s guide to New York, you don’t look like the most local of people. Easy prey for New York’s many vultures and vagabonds, the unmistakable feeling of vulnerability. Once you lose the suitcase, it’s fine. Once you’ve not been up for 26 hours straight (save two hours sprawled across the middle three of a 767), it’s fine. Once you’ve had a beer in you, it’s fine. Whether or not that’s because you’ve no longer got a 15 kilo suitcase to hamper your escape from any undesirable situation, or are more alert to duck and dodge any deviant, or possess the wonderful alcohol-fuelled arrogance, I can but only speculate.

Checked in to the Americana Inn and, after familiarising myself with the operation of my room’s fancy sink, made a move to do a bit of mid-afternoon shopping and have a general mooch about mid-town. Bought an FM radio for the iPod, which isn’t as crap as James Cridland would have you believe, had a look around the pure glamour that is Times Square, and went for a hot chocolate with TONY, the TONY guide, a notepad, and 101.1 WCBS-FM. Plans for the week were made rather loosely, along with hay and an early night…