Deporting the cat

Arriving at Banjul Airport for the second time in twenty-four hours was like walking into a reunion. 

‘Helen – you are now on the flight?’ – said the Phone Boy who was waiting for me at the door, when the driver from Woodpecker Resort dropped me off – he introduced himself as ‘Allergy’ – I am EpiPen trained you know, so was quite prepared. 

Woodpecker Resort include a transfer to the airport in the price of the room.  The hotel is actually opposite the entrance to Banjul International Airport, although the approach road is about a mile long, once you’ve waved at the security people and various extras in the adjacent shack.  I still can’t believe I’d contemplated walking that, in the middle of the night, with my Giant Orange Tortoise, by myself.      

‘Helen – welcome back!’ – said Lamine, the driver who had transported me to and from Woodpecker Resort and then to and from the Royal Air Maroc office that morning.

‘Helen – are you now booked on the right flight?’ – said the man with the Sparkly T-shirt who had had found Lamine for me.

I headed over to the Cart to see my friends from yesterday and purchased some drinks for the Phone Boy and a fellow traveller I had just met, who was also travelling to London.  They were all happy to see me.  The 13-year-old boy wasn’t there and the cart was now manned by an actual man.

We sat drinking Coke just outside the check-in area, waiting for it to open.  A scrawny ginger cat – one of the ones who had frequented the cart last night, strolled arrogantly into the check-in area. 

‘Helen – I am happy that you are now departing’ – said the Royal Air Maroc supervisor who had been the first to advise me that the flight the previous night was full. 

We said goodbye to the Phone Boy and trundled through the security arch and into immigration which consisted of four booths manned by gruff immigration officers.    

‘Helen? Is that you? I thought you had already gone’ – it was the immigration officer I had chatted to at the cart the previous night.

‘Yes, it’s me’.

‘You don’t have a twin sister’.

‘Not as far as I know – have you heard otherwise?’

He looked blank.

We chatted as I tried to manipulate my pterodactyl-like thumbs onto the tiny green screen that would let me out of the country.  It’s always a problem with those machines, as my thumbs are double-jointed so can’t naturally press onto that curious screen.  It would make playing the harp very difficult, if I played the harp, which I don’t.    

Curiously, immigration were asking everyone where they had been staying whilst in The Gambia which struck me as a bit pointless, considering that we were about to depart.

We went into the departure lounge, which consisted of an inside part and outside part filled with plastic tables and chairs adorned with plastic check tablecloths.  We sat outside and ordered some drinks with our final fist of Dalasis.  I just wrote fish instead of fist – my fingers are defaulting to ‘fish’.

The place gently filled with in intriguing mixture of travellers – lobster-red tourists heading home from holiday, their skin gently showing signs of peeling off like a snake shedding its skin; Gambians heading out on business; a large but miserable Scandinavian family occupied several chairs and tables – they didn’t have smile between them, or if they did, it had been lost.

We had to campaign for the WiFi password due to it only being available with the purchase of food, which we were not purchasing; I used my gentle powers of negotiation to obtain it.  The barman who gave it to me was about as happy as an angry porcupine.

The cat had made it through security and immigration and continued to prowl arrogantly around the departure lounge, awaiting its flight with the rest of us.

Eventually, there was an apocalypse of furious light and overwhelming sound.  Or it might have been the plane arriving.   

The time came and there was a flurry of people in uniforms with ID tags dangling around their necks.  The amassed bunch of sun-kissed travellers, Gambians heading home and abroad, the angry Scandinavian family and assorted extras queued up to show our passports once again.

I got to the front – ‘Helen! So you are now leaving for sure’ – it was the lady who had first told me my flight had left the previous day.  When she had said there was no space on the flight, I'd offered to help out as additional cabin crew, or to help the pilots in the cockpit - 'I'm very helpful', I'd said.  'I don't think that will be possible', she'd retorted, her expression unchanged.    

‘Yes indeed, I am leaving for sure!’ – this time, there were handshakes and laughter all-round.

We boarded the Royal Air Maroc flight and there seemed to be about a hundred other people who hadn’t been in the departure lounge, already in the plane.  Maybe they had arrived in the plane, or maybe they were just making up the numbers.

I had three whole seats to myself, so once we were air-borne I put all the arm rests down and lay across all three, just as though I was in business class.  The flight attendant looked like the human Moroccan equivalent of an awkward Road Runner, but moving slower and wearing a cardigan.  He was meant to come through the cabin with whatever that stuff is that they use to fumigate the cabin prior to take off, but seemed to get distracted a third of the way in, then suddenly remember that he was meant to be walking through the cabin with what looks like a broken firework.  The canister had expired before he reached the middle.

I was in blissful slumber when Road Runner woke me up and presented me with a grim breakfast in an ominous box.  I know I shouldn’t complain but it consisted of an indeterminable part of an animal embalmed in half a chunk of dry bread, plus a dry cake, then horrible coffee.  I fear that breakfast on the flight I am waiting for now will be another part of the same indeterminable animal embalmed in the other half of the dry bread.  I shall decline.  On the way out, I’m sure I had the same actual chicken on both flights.  Honestly.

I didn’t see the cat on the flight.