by Ian Cottrell, Hon Chairman SEA, Willowfalls Eurasiers
I like planning, I love planning and having contingencies to
the plan if the plan doesn’t work. So when Brigitte invited me to attend the
IFEZ meeting in Stuttgart, I jumped at the opportunity and set about, well you
know, planning. In the various conversations I thought it was for a day and a
half, so over the Saturday and the Sunday morning. I was not going to go all
the way to Germany without seeing something other than the inside of a hotel
and booked an early morning flight so I could have a mosey around the town before
meeting everyone for dinner on the Friday night. I had researched which S Bahn (Railway)
to catch and how much it was going to be. A few weeks in advance I printed off
all the tickets I would need. The plan was impeccable!
In my head I was catching the 21:30 coach to Heathrow on the
Thursday. Pottered around, had a nice bath and a lovely dinner and doing my
final check of the passport and paperwork and saw that it was the 19:30 coach I
should have caught. Oh Bum! I did manage
to get to Heathrow Via Victoria and arrived at 00.30 on the Friday morning. My
plan was to catch the free tube service between terminal 3 and terminal 5.
Followed the endless walk to the free tube and found that stopped running at
midnight. Retraced my steps back to the bus station and eventually found that
the free bus ran all night so hopped on. On the very helpful Heathrow website
it did say that “Areas have been designated for passengers to rest, lights
would be dimmed etc” The website lied. The only chairs available had been
specifically designed to offer no comfort whatsoever and actively encourage
people to move on. As for the dimmed lighting, well I have been in operating
theatres that have been darker. No chance of sleep then, crack on!
The flight over was great, no problems on the S Bahn and
arrived in the City at 10:30 local time. Pulled the straps of my rucksack tight
and went mooching. I did a lot of mooching. Stuttgart has one of the longest shopping
precincts I had seen. Must have been close to a mile long and not one shop was
open. It was a German Bank Holiday and boy do they take their Bank Holidays
seriously! Plan A, had me eating sausage and chips with mayonnaise from the
kiosk that was right outside the rail station. I don’t know exactly when they
had started the station redevelopment, but the first casualty was that kiosk.
Had to settle for Currywurst and a bread roll. Oh well I had been 31 hours
without sleep so head to the hotel and get my head down.
Rail travel in Germany is cheap and on time. Caught the S
Bahn to the University and then it was only a 2km walk to the hotel. In my
research it proudly proclaimed that Stuttgart University S Bahn station is one
of the deepest. I can attest to that as the escalators had been switched off.
All I was missing was a Sherpa and oxygen for the accent. Having Google mapped
the area I knew that I headed North from the station, get into the woods and
hang a left. What a lovely forest and sooo big. At the 30 min point I should
now be looking at the entrance of the hotel. Nope, just a lot more trees. Time
to get the mobile out and look at the map. Walking back and forth to orientate
myself a very nice German couple came to my rescue. They knew the area and set
off through the vegetation and I went sliding down inclines like I was skiing.
The conversation was about Brexit so I couldn’t escape it even over there.
Finally, time to get to the room and have a coffee and some sleep. Unpacked bag
and tried to put the adaptor into the circular electrical socket and it
wouldn’t fit. It possibly would have if I had been in The USA or Australia.
There was a distinct lack of kettle and no beverage making. Down the two
flights of stairs back to reception. I could have as many coffees as I liked
in the lounge area and they sorted me out a replacement adaptor. With only a
few hours before Brigitte’s arrival I decided not to nap and pottered around.
Right on time Brigitte arrived, in a whirlwind of greeting
everybody and being introduced to about a trillion people we had sat ourselves
down and I treated myself to a large glass of the house red. Everyone was
lovely and all had at least a few words of English and I truly felt welcomed.
The dinner was excellent, but now at the 38 hours without sleep point, my brain
was a little mushy and I decided it was time to head to bed.
To sleep, perchance to dream. Four hours after laying in
bed, Oh, that feels strange. Oh, that’s not good. Normally I have the constitution
of a horse, not on this occasion, Delhi Belly effectively wiped out any more
chance of sleep, so the rest of the night was spent watching the German
equivalent of Money from Nothing.
Decided the best thing was to avoid food for a day. Saturday
09:00 we gathered in the large room and the IFEZ meeting started. My German stretches
to counting to a few hundred, getting a room, getting fed and basic directions.
I can understand a little more but get hopelessly lost when the conversation is
fast and about technical points. Fortunately, Brigitte was my Babel Fish and I
loved the way after someone had been speaking for 10 min she condensed the
meaning to me in a short sentence. I was actually having fun stringing the few
words I understood into what I thought they were speaking about and bobbing
happily when Brigitte relayed what it was actually about, and I had guessed
correctly. 
Everyone was afforded the opportunity to contribute, and
they did with passion. I may not be fluent in the language, but you can still
glean a great deal from tone, inclination and pitch. The knowledge and
experience around the table was immense and I am terribly proud of Brigitte,
who is obviously held with great regard and was asked to undertake a study on
behalf of IFEZ. Having so many nations represented it was a mini United
Nations. I suppose the overriding impression I was left with was that
collectively they wanted to be as inclusive as possible and not cause any
upset. At 18:45 the meeting was declared closed and I asked Brigitte if the
start time was 09:00 the next day. She stated it was finished and this year was only held over one day (which, in all fairness, was in the agenda she had sent out) . The look on my face must have been priceless.
With calm resolve I retired to my room and thought that it
would be moderately easy to re arrange flights with the world’s favourite
airline. The 19:30 flight back to Heathrow was the only time that day that BA
was visiting this part of Germany. Oh Bum!
Sunday, I checked the forecast and it was cloudy with only a
40% chance of rain. Knowing that the town was probably still closed I had the
choice of a walk round a local lake with a charmingly entitled Bears Castle or
do something else. It was only a 14 km walk to the airport so decided on that.
A great way of seeing a different country and a productive way of wasting time.
Arrived back early into the UK and the extra ordinarily
helpful ladies at the coach station were adamant that I would have to wait for
the coach I booked at 22:30. That pulled into the final destination at 00:45 on
the Monday and my darling wife had parked the car 200 yards down the road. The
God’s had one last jest with me, the rain was so heavy that in only a short
space of time my waterproof jacket and clothes became drenched.
Today I bought a blue duffel coat, a red floppy hat and had
a sign made. It reads .....
PLEASE LOOK AFTER THIS BEAR – Thank You.
This, I decided, was the safest form of any future travel.
Ian Cottrell, Hon Chairman SEA, Willowfalls Eurasiers
