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| UV PROTECTION WAS VERY IMPORTANT ESPECIALLY FOR DANIEL! |
Shirley was of course invited too but after a lifetime's sun-worshipping can no longer take any sun or any temperature higher than minus twenty without breaking into a fierce sweat!
So vaguely aware that this might be too good to be true I set out in a large group made up of Gemma, Gemma's husband Derek, his mother Joan and and his young niece Amy, Dylan and my five month old grandson Daniel !
The five hour flight seemed to go on forever as Daniel either cried on my lap, his mother's lap, his father's lap, his Grandmother's lap, his second cousin's lap or Dylan's lap.
When he wasn't crying he was guzzling his mother's milk or filling his nappies with a continuous flow of sickly-sweet smelling baby poo!
When he wasn't crying, guzzling or pooing he would sleep fitfully on the floor at my feet under the seat in front of me or in an overhead locker!
But nothing really goes on forever unless you're talking about checking in at an Egyptian hotel after an exhausting journey!
About ten male receptionists managed to work very slowly and by the time that we got to the front of the queue we just hoped that they could sign us in rapidly and get us to our rooms after gathering all our passports for photocopying in a back office.
Egypt was ruled by the now-deposed Mubarrak and was essntially a country ruled by a military Dictator who governed under martial law.
When the staff lost Derek's passport a terror gripped them and it quickly became apparent that there was a very clear cut heirarchy behind the counter with no man daring to look his superior in the eye for fear of being 'disappeared'!
Eventually after an hour of accusation, counter-accusation, tears and appeals to Allah, frantic phone calls and men in suits emerging from Government limousines the passport was found in Derek's pocket where it had been all along!
A short buggy ride past the team of comfortingly armed guards at the main gate and over the busiest dual-carriageway in the world brought us to our three immaculate apartments.
Joan and I shared a room as did Amy and Dylan. Oh! HaHaHa!
No of course! I had been coerced into the holiday to be the NANNY and I shared with Dylan!
Dylan was and is the love of my life although two years on he has to share that love with his baby brat, I mean brother Daniel ! But not to worry, I have plenty in reserve!
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| I FELT TOTALLY SAFE AND RELAXED IN EGYPT! |
This is seriously said with no disrespect for my wife or my own children and although it doesn't sound right, any Grandfather will know what I mean!
And as Dylan's personal slave I carried him everywhere on my shoulders which now accounts for the loss of two inches from my height!
Gemma had warned me that the hotel complex was huge and being divided by that dual-carriageway it might take nearly ten minutes to walk through the beautifully manicured grounds to the restaurant!
It was no exaggeration and carrying a wriggling and heavy four year old for ten minutes in overwhelming heat is not my idea of a holiday, especially as I was expected to sing stupid songs all the way and run up to and pretend to throw him into the three swimming pools on the way!
The real reason for my free holiday was because Gemma had discovered the wonder of scuba diving and insisted that I qualified in England ready to join them on the startlingly beautiful Egyptian reefs.
The only trouble with that idea is that when you read the lengthy list of medical contra-indications you'll discover that any tendency towards asthma totally precludes diving. And that's because the air you're breathing from your tank can vapourise under certain conditions and cause a coughing fit which isn't to be recommended when you're ninety feet under water as it will rapidly cause you to DIE!
So as I am blessed with hayfever induced asthma I decided to wait for death on dry land.
Of course had I chosen to pursue the diving qualification and declared myself asthmatic I would have had to undergo exhaustive private medical tests costing a fortune which would have highlighted what I knew anyway and recommended not diving!
Gemma thought I was just chickening out and I think that despite saving us a considerable amount of money in qualification fees and actual diving costs when in the resort, Shirley thought I was too and I felt that from thence onward she treated me with a certain coolness and a more inferior hero-worship than I was used to.
I wasn't chickening out and anyway snorkelling turned out to be scary enough for me as I was swept miles away from our dive boat by a relentless and freezing current!
But during my preparations to not become a diver I discovered a fact that led to my being ridiculed until I produced firm proof that my claim was factual. And that was that when wearing goggles underwater without my glasses on, my otherwise rubbish vision was perfect!
My family laughed at me but the diving fraternity didn't as they knew it to be true! No one knew exactly why but they had heard about it and the main diving shop in Newcastle even told me that some divers had their prescriptions ground into their face masks! Don't ask me why as I didn't pursue that one!
Yes, I know you're confused and bored but for the tiny percentage who care, goggles are worn close to the eyes and facemasks are worn further away!
And it's all to do with refraction!
Anyway, Gemma and Derek are serious divers and they REALLY needed someone to accompany them on the boat to look after Dylan and the baby whilst they went below the waves!
And the answer to your unvoiced question as to why they didn't just leave the children on the beach whilst they went off is that Gemma was still breast-feeding the baby and had to take him with her and Dylan wouldn't leave my side so had to come as well.
I had no idea how bad things would become and before even stepping on board the boat I felt seasick because I hate travelling on water since I wrecked my hearing and thus my balance as a younger man by blasting my head with high volume music whilst wearing tight fitting headphones.
So now I not only can't hear very well which is why I talk too loudly and keep saying "Pardon?" but can feel dizzy just moving my eyes too quickly and have raging tinnitus that would send a weaker man mad!
When you eventually read my epitaph it may well say " PARDON ! WHAT DID YOU SAY THE BUS IS DOING ? "
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