Last week I went to Adelaide in South Australia on a sales trip. Many of my friends in Melbourne warned me to be careful of all the 'feral' people over there. This is an Australian term used to discribe the kind of people who would piss in your beer and spit on your food...and that's if you were being nice! As you can imagine, any original excitement I had about travelling there swiftly evaporated. Based on the advice given to me, it would seem that I would be getting far more of a taste of the people there than I was actually prepared to swallow!
On the day I left for Adelaide I was pretty anxious and pessimistic of the journey that lay ahead...the stress levels were magnified further when my Taxi failed to show up at the agreed time of 6.00am claiming not to have a booking for me. So things were looking ominous from the moment I stepped out of my front door...which started with a mad rush to get to the airport on time for my flight:
6.50am: Arrive at airport in person but not in mind, yet...frantically try to make it to checkin desk before flight leaves.
6.55am: Out of breath only to be told that flight is not scheduled to leave until 7.30am...f#*@! (Mental note: need to check flight times for future trips, might help.)
7.05am: Destress time (mental note: learn Yoga when I get back from trip). Buy an extra strong coffee in bid to wake myself up to world.
7.15am: Problems at security - affirmative (screened twice due to excessive metal but eventually cleared of any potential threat to self or terrorists).
7.30am: Flight departs. Feeling relaxed after watching flight attendants do safety demonstrations - therefore if flight crashes into millions of pieces at least I have my seat belt fastened correctly.
7.35am: Captain makes announcement to turn off all cell phones as they are dangerous and interfere with plane's equipment...(mental note: why do terrorists persist with bombs then, surely they have mobile phones?)
7.45am: Bright idea - remove sick bags from seats incase I need it after any 'feral' activity. Man in seat next to me wearing a very smart suit is watching me nervously as I do it... hopefully he's not sick.
8.25am: Arrive in Adelaide in one piece despite man in front talking on cell phone for nearly the entire flight.
8.20am: Exit airport...take deep breath (mental note: air seems safe enough) and brace myself for the worst...
Well, that was my journey over to Adelaide which I thought I'd share. Despite all the build up and negative expectations I had about the percieved hospitality I was to expect in Adelaide, I actually found the people there were very friendly and that my beers, to my relief, never got above room temperature! The city itself was clean, compact (I walked from one end to the other in under 30min) and neatly designed that I found traffic there virtually non-existant. In fact the week passed without incident except for the final evening when I encountered non-feral related situation.
That night I was invited out by a VIP client who I had already been out with on my second evening in Adelaide. We sat at a bar most of the evening chatting and having a few drinks before he asked me if I wanted to go to another place where we could carry on drinking. It seemed like a good idea at the time, after all, it was my final evening and the night was still young despite already having too much to drink. Where he took me was somewhere completely different to what I had in mind...we went to a strip bar! I was a bit taken back but...oh well, what the hell - first time for everything I suppose and most importantly, they served beers there too. However, while we were sitting patiently waiting for our order of beers to arrive, the first 'performer' sprang onto the stage. I was absolutely shocked and gobsmacked to realise that the 'performer' that stood before me was that of the male species!! The colour drained from my face as it dawned on me that I had inadvertently walked straight into a gay strip joint. I froze on the spot as I tried to work out whether I was feeling more uncomfortable watching a man 'performer' who was about to share his lunch pack with the audience, or for accepting an invitation to go to a gay strip club with a client who was VIP, buying my drinks...and also had a lunch pack to offer!! In the end, with my buttocks clenched and firmly presssed against the chair, I politely excused myself and left the club...quicker than you could say, "Village People."
When I returned to my hotel room I emptied my mini bar of all the miniature bottles of spirits to help me overcome the ordeal, albeit temporarily. I also began to understand why they call Australia the land "Down Under" - I certainly didn't want to be either down or under that evening...besides, I only had a single bed in my room anyway.
