England At Random

I just came back from England yesterday, 17 April, my second trip in eight months. No, I don't have a house in London.

My last trip was in late September last year, to settle my daughter Aida at University of Bristol for her postgraduate study. This time it was Bristol again, just to see her and make sure she was alright although her mother had been video-calling her every evening and every morning to find out whether she was alright. She's alright.

This trip was different from my previous trips to England or anywhere in the world (meaning mostly Indonesia). We didn't really plan or prepare anything, although we brought along a sackful of Brahims for Aida's upcoming fasting month. No itinerary or maps or Travelodge bookings, nothing. We firmed up the travel date only about five days before. The idea was to see Aida in Bristol during Easter holidays. That's all.

For those who've never heard of Bristol, allow me educate you. Bristol is officially UK's Most Artistic City for 2018. It's also Europe's Trendiest City for 2017. I hope that helps, but I'm uneasy about these rankings simply because they're unscientific. They keep changing every year for no apparent reason. Condè Nest rated Paris the prettiest city in the world in 2017 but Tokyo in 2018. What could've happened to Paris in one single year? Bubonic plague? If you think that's dubious, Doha was placed second in 2017. Doha and the whole tyrannous state of Qatar is glorified sand and stones and thousands of helpless migrant workers risking their lives building ugly World Cup sites. If you can buy the World Cup, a high place in a travel magazine is half a pittance.

Back to Bristol, I'm not sure what's the agreed definition of Artistic and which part of the city is Trendy, because the city ranks in the top ten most expensive in UK to live and breathe in. Aida's in-campus rent sets her back RM 850 a week or RM 3400 a month. Hotels are steep and scarce here but we'd  found a way out. We'd decided that Aida's 300 sq ft room should have enough space, air and sunshine for me and Aida's mother to hole up and breathe normally in the trendy  city.
 
A random trip like this allows me to create, improvise and operate by instincts, just like MacGyver. Incidentally there was a job fair in the Royal Lancaster in London, about two hours from Bristol. After a short deliberation, we thought (or I decided) maybe Aida should attend this job fair and, who knew, one or two prospective employers might fall for her.

This so-called job fair turned out to be a tame, all-Malaysian affair. It was organized by the UK and Eire Student Council specifically for Malaysian companies. Mah Sing and Top Glove were there, probably looking for Mandarin-speaking UK graduates with good UEC. Some weren't companies in a stricter sense, I mean, people like Khazanah, EPF, KWAP. This dark and windowless quasi-cartel is famous for covert investments in Mongolia, Umno and other scams. They were half a world away in London recruiting unsuspecting Malaysian students in UK while 500,000 unemployed graduates back home were competing with Banglas. I wondered which PH minister had approved this outing.

After the job fair, we did a quick round of the British Museum, one of the world's largest and finest. I'd not been to any museum since that scandalous ghost exhibition at Muzium Negara in late 90's. But I thought we had so much time to burn, why not go to a museum and feel civilized.  We knew it would be impossible to see the complete collection of eight million works in this museum. So our plan was to cover the Egyptian mummies and the Islamic artifacts, possibly in under one hour.

Believe it or not, this famous museum charges no fee. You could, in theory, visit it everyday, the whole day, the whole year, for whatever reason. If you feel generous, you may donate. There's a big box with a bold "Please Donate" at the entrance to attack your senses, but it's donation, so it's optional.  I still can't rationalize this counter-commerce. Is it guilty conscience? I mean, all those mummies and King Tuts and Rameses were never British subjects or products. I suppose Marks and Spencer can charge top prices for their merchandise made in Cambodian sweat shops, but the British museum can't possibly charge anything for something that don't really belong to them. Just one of my sardonic theories. Just ignore if you don't agree.

We were in two minds about going back to Bristol and breathing in Aida's room. After all of five minutes of hard thinking, we decided to go somewhere. We were torn between Liverpool and Brighton. Virgin Trains ticket to Liverpool had suddenly shot up to £70. Branston and his virgins had really been tracking my smartphone with their cookies. Brighton was cheaper, and nearer.

So it's Brighton, an hour and £10 away from London. Brighton was decidedly a charming seaside town and we had no regrets coming here. We put up at a guest house run by two Peruvian brothers, Leo and Miguel. When I mentioned Lima and Maccu Picchu, they jumped in unison and said something in Spanish to each other. Later I found out that they'd been in Brighton for more than twenty years and nobody here knew where or what Peru actually was. For three days, they'd greet me zealously and call me Che Guevara. 

I first heard about Brighton in early 70s when hundreds of Malaysian students (including a couple of classmates) flocked to its college or polytechnic to study engineering. Every other guy who went to Britain, went to Brighton. At the height of this Brighton binge, TNB even found it expedient to rent a hostel exclusively for its students, a much welcome relief to those who wanted speak Kelantanese full time.  I met one of them this morning at our neighbourhood mosque. He was all pumped up at the mere mention of Brighton and wasted no time with his personal ideas and virtues about Brighton beach and its famed nudist strip. What? Three days and two nights in Brighton, nobody told me about this place. Bloody, useless Peruvians!

We took a train to London Victoria Station before heading back to Bristol by bus. It was nice to be back "home". University of Bristol was still closed for Easter holidays, and the campus in spring was very quiet and joyful with pink and purple flowers blooming and bursting against the sedate sky and archaic architecture. The cost of living was high here, but there was so much quality of life. Tap water was perfectly potable and clearer than Spritzer.

There was plenty of time to reflect on Aida's journey, our journey, to Bristol. And to think that artistic and trendy Bristol wasn't actually our first choice. All along we'd been gunning for Glasgow, lured probably by its laid-back persona, unhurried charm and fishy tales of lakes with big snakes. Imagine taking a bus from London Heathrow to Glasgow then back to London then back to Glasgow then back to London Heathrow, eight hours each way. We could've died of either brain thrombosis or pure boredom. My late mother always reminded me that God knows what we don't know. She didn't know that I knew that.

After a week, my body system had finally and completely adjusted to UK daytime. We had only three more days, and I began to dread the thought of going back to Malaysia. Honestly I'd nothing against Lim Guan Eng. It's just that my body system is a very old, odd and slow body system and it would need at least two weeks to recover its circadian rhythm. In the meantime I'd have to suffer sleepless nights and have to watch endless Astro reruns of old Malay movies, with Hamid Gurkha, A R Badul and all. These guys are very talented and funny, but I really want to sleep.

The flight back was surprisingly punctual. I've read about extortionate parking fees at Heathrow for both cars and aircraft. That could be the motivation. Food on economy was technically Brahims in disguise. Our bags were half-full, so there was enough space for two packs of Sainsbury's multi-seed and Vogel's Linseed bread to bring back home for breakfast. This  was about the only thing I'd planned for.