The fall of the Berlin Wall – 30 years on.

The Berlin Wall has been down now for longer than it was up (1961-1989). A lot of stuff seemed to happen during that Cold War era but since the wall’s … demise it’s like very little of significance has actually happened, even though it has. When you live through the decades rather than read about them things are less dramatic.

Francis Fukuyama’s ‘The End of History’ is of course absolute pampers but for me at least, it does often feel like history is indeed over, the Manichean structure of it gone, and we are now living in post-historical times. And nothing means anything anymore. Maybe it’s the 24-hour news cycle, the desensitisation to carnage as a result of its hourly reportage.

Anyway, here’s a mediocre snap of the Berlin Wall from my first trip there in 2009. Later that day I went to Checkpoint Charlie with a pal of mine and said to him: “This is fucking shite.” I don’t know why I was expecting something magical.

And check out these two stunning movies:

 

Three days in Belfast.

A wee jaunt here for a wedding and an excuse to watch Titanic (1997) for the 169th time because of the Belfast connections; I couldn’t be arsed with the museum because I refuse to pay for anything that I can see for free on Google Images. I did, however, do quite a fair bit of wandering around the Titanic Quarter for some amateurish snaps on a fucked Android that has somehow managed to pap seven midgets in five cities.

I like Belfast. The history of the place is not a nice bedtime story but that doesn’t enter into my evaluation of its pubs and of course the Titanic connection, which is all that matters when it’s all said and done, eh.

Highlights: The airport bus (No. 300) driver calling a daft bloke driving the wrong direction down a one-way road a “gobshite”; the hotel receptionist asking me where and when the Titanic foundered (people really should know this); the Titanic Hotel charging a ridiculous £5.70 for a pint of Diet Cola (staff were awful as well), and, inevitably, watching Titanic (1997) in my sweatpants with a bottle of Peach Schnapps. Billy Zane is what it’s all about.

Not too shabby wall art, either.

Thai road-trippin’.

Time flies. This was six years ago today, and what a silly wee adventure it was, Bangkok to Rayong to Pattaya to Ayutthaya. The piece-of-shite motorbike I purchased off a Burmese borderline dwarf exploded about two hours into the journey to Rayong so I had to sit on a rotten minibus like a tinned sardine for half the day. But Fleetwood Mac got me through proceedings. I hate to appropriate the word ‘epic’ but this sojourn really was because it had everything; it was The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) but without Velcro dartboards to launch midgets at.

Good times.

The AAirpass actually exists.

It was sold for a one-time fee of $250k in an attempt by a cash-strapped American Airlines to raise revenue without having to borrow from the banks. Unfortunately (for them), they didn’t factor in just the levels of dedication the 28 pass holders (flying addicts) would bring to the agreement. Millions have been lost in fares and taxes, and a bloke by the name of Steve Rothstein, an investment banker from Chicago, was their number one ‘abuser’.

He took more than 10,000 flights and essentially circumnavigated the globe a zillion times before AA had enough of the geezer and managed to revoke his privileges. They cited various ‘fraudulent activities’ such as his habit of cancelling reservations or letting strangers use his companion pass (extra cost $150k).

This guy is a hero. Imagine the movie. I think you’d need to insert something more than comedy into proceedings, make it all Terrence Malick with the transcendental freedom of travel (until nasty corporation breaks the contract) the main theme. Or get a meagre Ryanair version made.

Of the 28 AAirpasses purchased, 25 are still valid.

Further reading:

https://thehustle.co/aairpass-american-airlines-250k-lifetime-ticket/

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/sep/19/american-airlines-aairpass-golden-ticket

https://www.economist.com/gulliver/2012/05/13/fly-anywhere-any-time-for-life

https://www.scoopwhoop.com/steve-rothstein/

Newcastle – in search of Jack Carter.

I was in Newcastle this week. The city is a bit of a toilet and their football fans quite possibly the most delusional on the planet. I fondly recall Michael Caine’s Jack Carter uttering the immortal line, “Listen, the only reason I came back to this crap house – was to find out who did it. And I’m not leaving until I do.” That’s Newcastle in a sentence.

It has its wee charming attributes, though, as do most post-industrial northern dwellings. It’s Hovis advert territory but with tracksuits. I spent my time here wandering about like a wee numpty in search of locations featured in the movie. I didn’t find any, although I did locate a hostel kitchen that had no sink.

Further reading/viewing:

https://www.movie-locations.com/movies/g/Get-Carter-1971.php 

https://www.getcarter.xyz/locations/arriving-in-newcastle/

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/former-get-carter-pub-re-opens-8285847

The Waverley – never forget.

The Shangri-La.

I try to avoid my former place of work these days because the experiences – which belong to what I refer to as the East Coast Epoch 2010-2012 – were so epic. Not epic like a Wagner-infused helicopter attack in Apocalypse Now (1979), but something a little bit more transcendent – the comedy and the banter. And I’ve never seen so many fruitcakes in all my life. Public spaces involving transport are microcosms of society. People are nuts.

My fondness for The Waverley is probably nostalgia, pretending in retrospect it was more enjoyable than it was. But it’s like that with most memories; time adds gloss to the mundane. I do, however, know more about trains than any topic aside from the drug and dietary habits of Adolf Hitler. So there’s always that.

Qantas Airways – New York to Sydney.

19 hours nonstop from New York City to Sydney, 40 passengers and crew monitored by scientists on board to determine the effects of the mammoth endeavour. What the fuck do you do to amuse yourself on a plane for 19 hours? Halfway through my 11-hour flight to Tokyo I began to feel like a part of me had died inside, though this may have been the effect of the new Planet of the Apes movie I was watching. On those chimp movies, I don’t get all the fuss over them. Fucking drivel. If I want to see chimpanzees I can just wander around some of the rougher enclaves of Edinburgh.

A typical Dalry boozer.

This flight, however. You’re going to need climbing frames and batting cages in the cabin, or a circus show to pass the time. Nevertheless, it’s an impressive feat. Nearly 10,000 miles in just a day. Not bad at all.

Further reading:

https://nypost.com/2019/08/23/qantas-to-test-worlds-longest-flight-at-19-hours-between-nyc-and-sydney/

https://robbreport.com/motors/aviation/could-you-handle-a-20-hour-flight-qantas-is-testing-nonstop-trips-from-new-york-to-sydney-to-see-2865430/

https://matadornetwork.com/read/exercises-can-long-haul-flight-without-looking-like-weirdo/

Airport meltdowns.

I was verily addicted to this show-stopper back in the day. EasyJet, Stelios, staff who couldn’t give a fuck about enforced politeness, wannabe passengers who are so stupid you wonder how they managed to emerge from bed without causing nuclear fallout. There’s something about airports that brings out the inner tosspot in the human species. It’s a sociologist’s paradise, as John Cooper Clarke would have put it.

Berlin 2009 was my own private kick-starter.

A full 10 years next week since I first set foot in Germany, this extended Berlin jaunt the beginning of many more liver-swelling shenanigans. In a decade the following have been … surmounted:

Amsterdam, Munich, Bratislava, Vienna, Brussels, Prague, Budapest, Kraków, Amsterdam again, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Bremen, Gothenburg, Tallinn, Amsterdam again, Munich again, Stockholm, Frankfurt again, Poznań, Bangkok, Oslo, Hamburg, Osnabrück, Bremen again, Tokyo, Kaunas, Riga, Warsaw, Gdańsk, Dublin, Kraków again, Oslo again, Sliema, Geneva, Copenhagen, Bremen again, Dortmund, Cologne, Bonn, Amsterdam again, Milan, Venice, Rome, Dublin again, Warsaw again, Berlin again, Basel, Bilbao, Reykjavík, Salzburg, Sliema again, Albufeira, Straubing, Berlin again, Szczecin, Salzburg again, Munich again, Wroclaw, Porto, Sofia, Straubing again.

Hitler’s Bunker today.

Berlin 2009 was unique in that I did it entirely internet free. I had no snazzy smartphone and wasn’t on any social media platforms. I had a mere camera and that was it. Consequently, I actually saw shit and took it in. No phone = no distraction, no barrier between me and the Grey City’s peculiarities. It was the most productive slice of tourism I’ve ever done and the last time I’ve used a paper map. In a sense it was a crossroads trip, the last archaic adventure.

Mark Renton Street, Edinburgh.

Calton Road this afternoon. It struck me today that I’ve never once snapped this Mark-Renton-gets-run-over spot, the manic laugh he offers to the driver an iconic snippet from Trainspotting (1996).

I was an employee (an actual ‘trainspotter’, no less) of East Coast Railways a decade ago and used to sneak out the back of Waverley Station to this Renton hideaway for a cheeky fag and a can of Monster, my walkie-talkie in hand just in case my absence was noted. Come to think of it, 30% of my ‘working day’ consisted of either this filmic interlude or listening to Kanye West tunes in the ScotRail bogs.

“Where are you?”

“Just having a shite, I’ll be on the platform in a minute.”

Those were the days.