Hamburg

 

This is the weekend of the big event.

Our friends 50th birthday. My parents decided to drive from Geneva to Hamburg. IT was not a problem as we literally live in a car.

I'm in charge of the GPS, I read books, I watch movies and I'm in charge of catering (I tell my parents I'm hungry, and we find a nice Marché with all day hot meals).
  I was very worried about the event, but it went well.
  First I learned that if 35 ladies had their hair done at a hairdressers, and there is a torrential rain a gentlemen is required to hold an umbrella above as many of them as possible on their way from the hotel to the bus which was collecting us.

Another small problem was the strange, polite and probably social rules around hunger and food.
  I mean, we were all hungry and nice ladies were coming around with trays full of nibbles, but I couldn't for the life in me grab some and simply eat. We were standing around the table and sipping drinks for around an hour when I decided that I can't take those delicious smells any longer. I took the first bacon and cheese mini-roll. The lady holding the tray seemed to have been delighted that I took some weight off of her load. This encouraged me. Having experienced this, I always asked for a mini-roll when she walked by. which kind of created a nice bond between us. She always stopped at our table and offered me more food. Heaven!

Somewhere halfway through the party my mum gave me the look. I traced her eyes to see where she was looking. She was looking at my shoes. Oh no. It appears that although I was wearing my new nice sandy coloured trousers, I must have been distracted when putting the shoes on, and I put on my old black scrubby muddy trainers. As I do everyday.

All went well until the supper was served and the live music started to play. My dad in the heat of the conversation accidentally spilled quite a large amount of red wine down my mums new, posh, linen, cream trousers from her favourite London's boutique.

As I watched my dad pouring white wine down my mums trousers in attempt to minimise the damage, I thought this one will be a hard one to beat. (Hi Dad!)

The trip was amazing. We had breakfast in an old mill and I got a ride by the 'Birthday Boy' in the top of the range, new 7 seater Mercedes with a 5.5 litres engine. Wow. It accelerated from 0 to 60mph in less than 5 seconds (Observation: Women do not enjoy this kind of experience and it would be better to leave them to continue with their breakfast, maybe to get their glass of champagne while the boys go outside to try their new toys).

Unfortunately we had to drive back home in our old car.