Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Of insurance claims, naughty boys and death machines

My insomniac brain has been mulling over various stresses in my life, and one that comes to mind is the saga of the insurance claim for an accident I had at a work meeting in June, where I opened the taxi door & scratched the side of a passing car. Long story short: Taxi driver claimed the cab was insured for all damage: lies, and probably an illegal Indian driver, who did not return the calls of the damaged car's owner. The car owner - nice lady - eventually claimed on her policy, but asked me to pay the $600 excess. I did so, and started a tedious process at work to recover the money from QUT's travel insurer. Then I got an unpleasant call the day before departure to Europe from a debt collector who told me I owed them some amount around $3000 - asked me lots of questions, but wouldn't answer mine. So I evaded she said I'd get details in a letter. Now the insurance company has given the car owner the excess back, and they've given it back to me. So I was lying sleepless mulling over when that will arrive, what beaurocro-nightmare will result when I try and get the money back from QUT's travel insurer - who has been wholly uncommunicative about the original $600. Blah Blah, Money, Paperwork, etc.

But during this process of thought I recalled that my maternal grandfather, Ernie, a gentleman, Christian (in the best possible way), and photographer, lawn bowler, bird-watcher, nature lover, farmer, caravaner, and caravan salesman was also described to me as a child as working as an expiditer. Which I only later came to understand as a chaser-upper of debts. I can only imagine that I would not have felt so harrassed had Ernie been the one to call me about the insurance claim.

So what of naughty boys and death machines you ask? Well, Ernie (I should say "grandpa", because that is how I really knew him), was also a pilot during the second world war. Hence the death machines. I think that he actually spent most of his time flying Tigermoths with trainee pilots who then went on to be given spitfires to strafe Rommel's troops in North Africa. I'll have to ask my mum sometime for details, as it hasn't really been a topic of conversation in the family for decades - not for any good reason - just hasn't come up. But I'm imagining young Ernie flying a spitfire, with it's viscious teeth painted on the front, being sent to kill other young men marching through the north African desert. It does not really reconcile with my image of my gentle grandpa, who was so nice to my boyfriend when we went to South Africa on holiday in 1999, with his elephant-watching tips.

Now back to insomnia, in a 1980s hotel/apartment building in Karlsruhe, which was no doubt built on the site of a bombed out building, destroyed during the war - perhaps by the only other person who I know was a pilot for the Allies - my grade 9 English teacher, Mr Miles. He seemed kind of damaged by the experience of raining bombs down over Germany on civilian targets, and perhaps as a result (or perhaps not) was incapable of maintaining discipline over a class of 30 naughty boys. We were very cruel to him, calling him Toad, and playing all kinds of willfully cruel games on him because we knew he was weak, and old and, damaged.

So I lie here sobbing big salty tears for the dead on the spot where I now reside for the night, and for the living who were forced to kill them, and managed to go on with their lives, with varying degrees of grace and dignity, and for myself, the thoughtless naughty boy.

How trivial the scratch on the car door, and the complex machinations to reclaim the price of paint job.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Mutilés de guerre

At the head of the usual list of people (pregnant women, the elderly, the disabled) for whom easily accessible seats are reserved in the Paris Metro is listed "Mutilés de guerre". Which, without doing a web translation, I'm assuming means war injured... but I think French "mutilés", which brings "mutilation" to mind, is much more evocative.

It also brings to mind stories told to me in the past by Parisiennes that after the guerre all the licences to to sell cigarettes in France (the Tabac owners) were given to members of the resistance to the Nazi occupation, which explains, to this day, why you can't buy cigarettes anywhere else... much to the consternation of Aussies smokers I've been here with, who run out of fags at 2am in a nighclub, and then can't buy any more. (Do your own wiki-goo to check the "real facts" if you're interested.)

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Tuesday, November 09, 2010

Dear Diary

I must have written this to myself several times in various notebooks (paper ones) on overseas trips... but here goes in public:

With solo international travel, the highs are higher and the lows are lower.

But today it was the other way around. About 3pm I was slumped over a lecture theatre desk with that aboslute bone-marrow deep fatigue with my head over my folded arms, wondering whether I'd be able to even stand up & walk to my workshop where I was giving a paper presentation an hour later.

Of course that only lasted about 1/2 an hour, and the presentation went just fine. And a couple of hours after that I was drinking Champagne (well, appelation Loire method traditionelle, which tastes like a $15 Aussie sparkling - i.e. pretty reasonable - but it's not Champagne) at the Grennevillier city hall, and enjoying the conversation. After which I had someone approach me and profess to be a fan of a CORBA Trader paper I wrote in 1995. And 1 hour later, I had negotiated the Metro back into centre de ville and was eating a Croque Monsiour in a window table, drinking a red wine (when I'd ordered a white - but didn't have the words to say "that's not what I asked for"). Then I got  a smile from a cute random passer by. How high.

And then when I ordered "un autre glas vin" (the next most important thing to learn in any language after "beer" or "wine" is the translation of "another") and I got a white, I did have the words "c'est different", and got a replacement red. I sometimes wonder about my need for acceptance from random wait staff in other countries... but probably more so in France than elsewhere.

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Monday, November 08, 2010

Why the Pope seems like an automaton

Just watching his visit to Spain on TV I noticed (perhaps for the first time consciously) that the pope never moves his arms when he walks, which gives him a bot-like appearance.

The facial expression is also pretty fixed into that attempt at a benign smile that turns out more, you know, Darth Sidious.

A quick image search reveals plenty of pre-made comparisons. But is my arm movement observation fresh?... almost certainly not - I'm not gonna search that.


What's new in Paris

Well, the first time I came here was 19 years ago... time flies when you're having fun.

It seemed like an immutable characteristic of Paris that the footpaths were a great big dog toilet - which I was reminded of by Brett Whitely's 15 Great Dog Pisses of Paris in a gallery a few years later. It was more the turds that you had to aoid stepping in all the time that was the problem... Well - that's changed. I'm still seeing lots of dogs, but their owners must be picking up after them these days.

The other global trend that Paris has now fully adopted is a no smoking inside rule. On my last visit (2006) they were phasing it in with mandatory non-smoking sections in bars & restaurants.

Oh - and BTW, the food's still amazing, and the architecture still beautiful. Well, unless you go out the the Peripherique, where my conference is starting tomorrow. Compare and contrast.

My picture (Hôtel de Ville) above - Google Maps' (Gennevilliers RER) below.

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