HOME JAMES

or is that just a quote my mum uses and nobody else?

Whatever the case, 1.30am Sat night finds me sitting, exhausted in the Rio de Janeiro airport, waiting to be processed out of the country.

There's all manner of people-watching pleasure to be enjoyed. A woman with the most striking resemblance to Miss Piggy I've ever seen. You'd think if you looked that much like her, you wouldn't curl your hair in EXACTLY the same style. Her mother looks like she might have once shared the trait, before massive amounts of surgery that have left her looking more like Michael Jackson With A Miss Piggy Hairstyle.

I don't know if it's the late hour, but I always find myself thinking these mean thoughts in airports. It was the same leaving Mexico, a stream of consciousness like:
"Denim with denim, when will Mexico learn it's just wrong. Why do people wear it like a suit here? Why is that woman wearing gold heels at 3am in the airport? God, that is one hairy guy. Whoever gave that poor lady those foils deserves to be shot."

Unnecessary, all of it.

Back to the here and now in Rio and I'm fascinated by a couple. I can't work out where they're from but they're young, maybe 25. They first catch my eye because of his Inspector Poirot moustache. Not many 25 year olds outside of the south coast of India have moustaches these days. He looks exactly like one of those classic skinny detective characters, or maybe someone from Fawtly Towers, I can't put my finger on it but it's rivetting. Actually, yes, Manuel from Fawtly Towers, that's it.

She looks like Marisa Tomei and holds the honest belief that his role on this earth is to make sure she's happy. She passes the time with activities like being photographed (by him), directing him on how to stack their bags correctly, complaining, rousing, changing out of patent leather heels into flip flops (at least she's sensible) and complaining.

It's like watching a road crash, for some reason I'm rivetted.

Finally I get them out of my system and head for the boarding area. Five minutes later they arrive and plonk their massive amounts of hand luggage down right next to my head, which is encased in hoodie for the purposes of sleeping. You'd think that'd be the implication, but no, the loud complaining and equally loud placating continues until we finally board. Finally, sleep is near.

I make myself comfortable in the window seat, and am just closing my eyes in the upright position (no reclining permitted before takeoff) when I hear a familiar sound.

It's her.

Are they stalking me? The thought momentarily crosses my mind that they are spies (ok, so I'm tired and irrational) but I dismiss it as spies are supposed to blend in with the furniture and she acts more like the world is a table and she's dancing on it.

He takes charge of stowing the hand luggage, and in the process of demonstrating his manliness crushes the carry-on luggage of several other people, which makes me wonder if perhaps they may be Israeli.

(borderline humour)

Then does undoes all his good work by taking off his suit jacket (on which he was carrying her backpack and I found myself a little distressed about the shoulder pads getting crushed. Why is he wearing a suit on the plane anyway?) to reveal a waitcoat. This guy has read way too much Agatha Christie.

She then reclines her seat into my face. Definitely Isreali. (SORRY! not funny I know...)

I consider several courses of action, including popping my head over the seat and yelling at her, popping my head over the seat and hitting her, but opt for the more subtle, kneading my knees into the back of her seat.

The results are less than stunning.

Anyway, make it home ok and find myself stuck in an immigration line two hours long with 'mauricio'. He's Brazilian and ready to handle topics like "are latinos less trustworthy than Australian men?", "could you have bought a house if you hadn't done all that travel?" and "quirks of language" (where I unwittingly disclose that I hate Portuguese. Honestly I have to stop doing that.

We really pass the time nicely, but not nicely enough for me to stand by him when he comes out of customs to discover his baggage has been lost. I know, I'm a terrible person, but staying just would have led him to believe that I'd make a dependable wife.

No hard feelings though, because (yes I am writing this post facto) he wrote the sweetest email a couple of days later to say that he'd gone to California and:

I liked a lot to talk to you and your way of thinking etc...I haven't seen you before but It seemed that I knew you before from the way we talked (you know what I mean)? ...but my trip just
changed the direction and I am here right now in california ok!

OK!! Sweet...

The first thing I notice is that the air still smells like sewerage, but in a nice familiar sort of way.