Category: Travels

Change often goes unnoticed, perhaps because it happens so slowly, or we do not want to have change so we block it out, or it happens while we are being distracted by something else.
 
The previous months have been full of warmth, goodwill, happiness. It was the summer months.

I have been training and travelling to many places, in Turkey, Italy, Malaysia, Bahrain and many places in the UK, I have been very busy.

Ok, there had been down days when it was cool or wet, but the rest was sunny, bright, warm, making me feel good, young at heart, happy.

Now, suddenly, change.

Here in the UK, as in other parts of the world, we have had bad weather. The sun has disappeared, we seem to be under a dark cloud every day. It is raining. It is cold.

Suddenly, people here in the UK are wearing warm clothing, jumpers, coats.

Gone are the Gucci sun glasses.

Today I went for a walk and had a visual signal that change was with us.

Under a heavy clouded sky, standing by the fast flowing cold river Thames, swollen by recent rains, I noticed that the river birds, swans, geese, ducks, were fewer in number than there had been in the summer, restaurants had less people eating at outside tables, but more noticeable were the trees on the opposite bank of the Thames.

The River Thames at Kingston upon Thames in September 2008

Oh Poo Poo, change is happening. Best make the best of it.

I was searching around or surfing the internet and came across an old favourite Google Earth. (click to download).

Google Earth maps the earth with images obtained from satellites, aerial imagery and what is known as geographic information system (GIS), or 3D images. You are presented with the Earth as a globe, and zoom into a particular place, seeing detailed pictures as if flying overhead like a bird.

I looked at my own home at the moment in Norbiton Hall, Kingston upon Thames, my home in Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia, then my old family home along Spring Hill, Chasetown, where my mother and father raised me.

 
Norbiton Hall, Kingston upon Thames, UK.                      Desa Palma, Alma, Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia

 
68 Springhill, Chasetown, UK

Then there was the back shed where I would play and hide if my mother called me, and I knew I had done something wrong from the tone of her voice.

I wondered up and down the street, “Oh that’s the Bentons’ house.” “There’s were the Ormrods’ lived.” “My friends house, the Pascoe twins, David and Roger.”

Then I looked down at where my old school had been, Chase Terrace Secondary Modern. It was a long, single storey building, I think having been designed by an architect who had just played with the ink blob test.

Place some ink in the middle of a piece of paper, fold the paper in half, pressing the ink. When the paper is opened, the ink image may look like a butterfly, the image is identical on the two halves.

So it was with Chase Terrace Secondary Modern School. The two halves were identical, joined in the middle by the two assembly halls and the kitchens, then one by one the class rooms, ending with the out-buildings the toilet blocks.

In my early days at the school, one half was for boys and the other was for girls, and neither were allowed to meet. The boys started at a different time to the girls, had different play (break) and lunch times. It was only in my last year that the two schools amalgamated into a co-educational system.

Looking down at Google Earth, my old school had gone.

My toilet blocks had gone. I was “Bog Prefect” in my last year, looking after the toilets, and they had gone.

The school field was half its’ size, it now had buildings on it, and the long school building was a square structure.

Chase Terrace School, with a car park on the right where my toilet block was.

This visit to Wetlands Center London held its’ surprises till last.

Around the 43 hectare site are designated walks, with places of interest described well and plenty of chance to interact with the displays. Children were really enjoying themselves, probably seeing for the first time, insects and bugs living in water, frogs wallowing in the small pools.

At strategic places are hides overlooking the lakes, which enable birdwatchers, or as they are called twitchers, to observe wildfowl at leisure, with their binoculars and cameras with expensive high powered lenses.

A three story hide at London’s’ Wetlands Center

Away from the wild natural areas are small enclosures which house collects of different breeds of wildfowl.

 

Wonderful ducks at the Wettland Center, I did not get the breed

 

Eider duck

 

Wetlands Center Duck

 

White-Headed Duck

 

Whistling White-Headed Duck

 

Swan from South America

 

Ringed Teal

 

Black-necked Swan

 

Black Swan from Australia 

Great day out. But I did catch a bus back rather than walk.

The London Wetlands Center, see previous article (click here), promised some wonderful sights of wild birds, rare and beautiful wildlife including Bitterns, Kingfishers and a colony of endangered Water Voles.

It is a great place to visit, and there are lots of birds to see, but they are a little scarce or low in numbers.

When you consider the numbers of swans in Kingston on the River Thames (CLICK TO SEE PICTURE), compared with one or two swans swimming in the lake or, with a signet resting in the grass with one of its’ parents in the Wetlands Center it, is a little disappointing.

 
Swans on the River Thames at Kingston                           A signet with its’ swan mother at Wetlands
I did catch sight of an endangered Water Vole, and a couple of its’ young, but they are shy animals and difficult to photograph. Still I saw more than most people, as they just walked straight passed the area where the Water Voles were.


An endangered Water Vole at London’s Wetlands Center.
I had to smile at the small young birds following mother, or just floating there, not worried if I was watching them or not.


Young ducklings with mother at Wetlands, London

White-headed duckling at the Wetlands Center, London

Some of the pictures I will show in Londons Wetlands Center next.

Globe trotter. Jet setter. Lucky.

Names I have been called for the type of work I do.

Yes I travel a lot with my work as an International Trainer. China, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, India, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Italy etc. Then there are the holiday trips, Peru, Ecuador, the Galapagos Island, Iceland, Thailand, Spain, Bali.

Yester-year, travel or air fares were cheap, but with governments putting taxes on travelers and the cost of fuel, it is getting more and more expensive.

The major national carrier airlines, British Airlines, Alitalia, Turkish Airlines, Malaysian Airlines, Gulf Air, are cutting corners in trying to save money, and in the light of increased competition from start-up airlines and the low cost cheap carriers like Asia Air, EasyJet, Ryann Air, Onur Air, offering less and less.

Often, as you start looking for prices to get from A to B and back to A again, the low cost airlines seem to be cheaper. But, it is the hidden add-ons, to pay for a snack and a drink, to pay to put a suitcase or luggage in the aircraft hold, the cost of getting to an airfield, the taxes, that the true cost is revealed, and there is not so much difference in pricing.

For me, I live about twenty minutes from Heathrow, and by taxi, I would pay about £30 (Pounds Stirling). Luton Airport where most of EasyJet flight depart will take perhaps one hour thirty minutes by taxi at a cost of £80 (pounds Stirling). Stansted Airport where most of Ryann Air depart from is a good two hours away, and about £110 (Pounds Stirling) by taxi.

Then where do they land at the destination. Add that cost into the equation, and the scheduled, national carriers are often cheaper.

My trip to Verona (see article) required me to firstly go to Bergamo to work with and visit my colleague Alessio Roberti recovering from a knee operation.

There is an airport, Orio, which is 10 minutes away, but to fly to it would mean a 5:30am departure from Luton Airport. How would I get there. Too expensive for a taxi, no public transport at that time of the night, and I cannot drive and leave the car there, as I will not return to Luton Airport but Gatwick, the other side of London.

The best way to get to Italy was to fly from Heathrow’s Terminal 5 at 11:00am with British Airways, BA576.

A quick bus ride for £2 (Pound Stirling) to Heathrow, and a short underground/tube/metro ride to the new Terminal 5, my first visit. I left the tube station via the escalator for Departures. All well to the next floor level up with lots of signs for Arrivals, but once there, no signs for Departures located on the next floor (top floor). I could not find or see an escalator to take me up there, and I was not the only one. The only way I could get there was to take a lift down to the tube station and then a lift back up to departures. I was confused.

The flight to Italy, would take me to Milan’s Malpensa airport, an hours bus ride into the center of Milan. From the center of Milan there would be another bus ride to Bergamo where I would be picked up, another hours ride.

After visiting Alessio and his lovely family, I had to get to Verona, This involved a train journey from a small station called Traviolo, again about an hour. Riding the Italian railways is an experience, good clean trains, but the stations seem to only have name sign, so depending were you are seated, you either know where you are or not. Catching the 9pm train meant that there was no way I would see the sign of Verona anyway. The only way was to hope the train would be on time, and I knew the expected arrival time, so get off then. Trouble was the train stopped outside Verona station.

My flight back from Verona was BA2599 at 10 pm, it would mean an arrival at Gatwick at 11 pm, enough time for me to get across from arrivals to the train station, catch a train towards London, change at Clapham Junction for the local train back to Kingston upon Thames, the last train being 1am.  

Having been dropped off at the airport early by Raffaele Tovazzi at the airport, I had three hours to wait for my flight. Well that will be enough time for a meal at the restaurant, not quite up to the usual high standard and quality food of Italy, but I can sit and relax. I sit eating some sort of meat and my eye caught the departure screen, my flight BA2599 delayed 45 minutes.

Oh Poo Poo, not good. Not only that but a plane load of tourists had their flight delayed and were given vouchers for a meal in the restaurant, meaning I would have to leave.

I went outside and sat in the car park and watched the sunset, tired, fed-up and concerned if BA would actually get me home.

Sunset at Verona Airport

I raced through the terminal upon arrival, purchased a train ticket, and then asked when the next train to London was.

Big Oh Poo Poo, it had gone, the next one would be one and a half hours later, and I would not get a train back to Kingston. Idiot, why didn’t I ask first before buying the ticket?

Nothing for it, order a taxi. £45 (Pound Stirling), and back home at 2:30 am.

Globe trotter, jet setter. Forget it. Stay at home.