The Next Adventure

As in Hawaii, I was confronted with yet another variant on the English language. Most of my fellow-workers had Cockney accents. Cockney is generally associated with working-class Londoners from the East End, although it has migrated out from there.

I had to decide whether I was going to pick up on this new way of talking or hold on to what I considered to be correct English. I succumbed. It is a fun kind of way to talk. One of the phrases often used is innit. This means “isn’t it” which you use at the end of a sentence to emphasize what you’ve just said. When you say it, you do not pronounce the ‘t’. Because of my New Zealand background and my enjoyment of the English accent in general, Cockney began to become a part of my natural diction with my fellow Londoners.

It was during this time in London that something happened that led to my next adventure. My brother got engaged. He had met a girl in Hong Kong named Carol. Carol had been born in the Philippines but her family had moved to Hawaii when she was two. That’s where they planned to get married in May. Carol’s sister and brother-in-law, Luz and Mickey were leaders of the FEET team we had spent time with in Calcutta when we were shooting footage for Procla-Media.

I decided I would try to go to the wedding but make a bigger journey of it. Little did I know how much bigger it would become. I found an amazing deal on tickets. I could go round-trip from London to New York for 299 pounds. Then if I bought that ticket, I could buy six flight segments within the US for another 199 pounds. A trip usually took up two flight segments because you had to change planes at least once to get anywhere. Then I could also get a round-trip ticket from Los Angeles to Hawaii for another 149 pounds. The exchange rate at the time was about 1 ½ US dollars to the pound, so the entire trip would cost me about a thousand dollars, which was pretty good at the time.

For my six segments I decided to use two to go from New York to Florida to see some friends there, two more segments to get to Los Angeles where the Anastasis was going to be and so I could catch my flight to Hawaii, then I would use the last two segments to get back to New York to catch my flight back to London. That was the plan anyway. 

I had a female boss at Baskin-Robbins who was the first of several female bosses I have had in my working career which I have very much enjoyed. I find them to be very kind and nurturing. However, I had to quit the job because I was going to be away for several months.

We got paid in cash but on the week following the one we worked. Because I was leaving and couldn’t come back to get it, my boss decided to give me my pay in advance. She did it because she knew my character - that I was honest and faithful and would not take advantage of her generosity. Nevertheless, she did instruct me to make sure I worked out the full final shift which I was only too willing to do. However...

It was a cold day and very slow. The girl I was working with was jealous that I was going to America. She was asking me where I was going and what I was going to do. Then she kept responding with the Cockney expression, 

“It’s auright for some”. Which means, “Man, you’re lucky and I’m jealous”.

I didn’t have much to do to get ready but I was itching to get going. The girl kept telling me I should just go. It got down to about three hours left in the shift and although I felt guilty about it, I did decide to just go ahead and leave early. That was a decision that would come back around months later with a very unexpected result. But for now, I was on my way back to America.


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