We’re all going….

Posted by Barbara on May 23, 2022 in Blog, Brexit, Europe, Leisure activities, Living today, Seasonal, Travel | 2 comments

I’m so looking forward to my holiday next month. It will be the first ‘proper’ summer holiday that I have had since 2019 – obvs – and it all feels a bit odd. Like thousands of other people, this is a postponement of a trip scheduled for last year, when the concept of battling with masks/tests/flights and locator forms seemed quite impossible.

So it’s best foot forward and hoping I can remember all the stuff needed when it is more than a camping trip. Can I still work out how to scan my e-passport? How will I feel when I have to join the ‘non-EU citizens’ queue at passport control? Actually I still have a burgundy passport that was issued when I was indeed a EU citizen, so I have documented proof of my status. Or is that more wishful thinking?  How will I feel when the Brexit stamp of shame is added in blue ink on an obscure page of the passport?

When I was languishing on the sofa with Covid a couple of months ago I resorted to watching old films, safe in the knowledge that I knew the plot, recognised the actors and therefore my – fortunately temporarily – depleted brain cells would be able to cope. After three Marx Brothers films in one day, Some Like it Hot and A Hard Day’s Night, I came across Summer Holiday. I was a smallish child when it came out, but was taken to see it by my elder brother, who acted as my gateway to that other world inhabited by people substantially bigger than I.

The only thing I remembered was the red bus and the eponymous song.  Reader, if you have never watched it and need to know what a 1960s holiday could be, now’s your chance. It is gloriously light, funny, silly and pure escapism. Just what we need.

I would like a bit more spontaneity with my holidays; I’m not sure about driving a bus across Europe the way Cliff did, but I do remember my parents’ approach.  When I was 3 and my brother was 6 they packed the car, placed my brother and me head to toe on the back seat and drove to Cesenatico on the Adriatic coast of Italy. They were not remotely bothered as to where they would stop and where we might sleep. Sometimes they drove through the night taking turns at the wheel while the other one slept. Sometimes they didn’t. I do remember us arriving in Milan late one night on our way home from one such holiday. My parents drove round town trying to find a hotel, with no luck. Finally they gave up and headed for the local police station. Fortunately my father had a good command of Italian, along with 4 other languages, so he was able to plead our case relatively eloquently.

It worked, although we did not end up billeted in a hotel. I was fast asleep in the back of the car but remember being picked up by my father and laid gently down in a cot. Sleepily I tried to object that I was far too big for such a thing but was shushed back to sleep. I woke in the morning to see the three other members of my family lying on small beds with metal frames. We were in a side ward of the local hospital, this being the only accommodation the local polizia had been able to find. Who needs Airbnb or booking.com?