RE: Two Months In Europe With Lachlan
09-06-2016, 03:18 AM
I squirm through and around the bathroom door again, and fumble right-handed with the taps. They loosen with a squeak, a rusty noise confirmed by a splutter of red that’s quickly drowned out amongst my hand-blood. I’m checking the remaining cabinet underneath the sink, best as I can at any rate while my left hand’s sitting up in there. The cabinet is similarly worthless for first aid, with nothing but the promised toiletries: soaps, individually vacuum-packed sponges and washcloths, and a spare bathrobe.
The towel I wrapped my hand in is now a bloodied mess crumpled on the floor, which will definitely stain if I get distracted and leave it lying around. I tool around with the lever until it drains the now-cranberry vodka contents of the sink, grab a wad of toilet paper to press against my sliced-up hand, and toss the towel in the sink with a bar of soap.
It’s just as I get the right quantity of lukewarm flowing from the tap that my phone rings from the bedroom. Again.
I pick up my cell phone. "Yes, hel—" I yank it away from my ear on reflex. It's not a human voice. It' a horrible, screeching cacophony from outer space. Some idiot is trying to send a fax to my cell phone. Annoyed, I hang up.
It suddenly occurs to me: what if that call on my cell phone had merely been a distraction to get my back to the open window? I pocket my cellphone and swivel on my heels. No such misfortune, for now. Nevertheless, I proceed with caution back into the bathroom, keeping a special eye on the mirror. The running water masks my footsteps, but the same could apply to an intruder.
Nobody's there but me, Lachlan. I take a look at the fire escape handle, to see — astonishingly — that the window hasn't so much as budged. Before, I was worried it'd be too easy to open. Now, I'm worried that, in an actual emergency, I wouldn't be able to. I'm more careful this time. I take a washcloth out of the drawer and wrap it around the handle. I make sure the door is open behind me. I brace my left hand with my right. My cell phone rings. It's that awful noise again. I hang up immediately.
I simply can not stand for these interruptions every five seconds. I have to do something now, or I'll never be able to focus and get anything done at all. I fumble with my cell phone in wet hands and call the number right back.
"Hello! We see you're calling from an internationally roaming phone. If you have inquiries about your current tour, please input the six-digit Trippass number found on your e-itinerary. Or, call our regional —" I hang up. Why are they trying to fax my cell phone? I go back into the bedroom, sit on the bed (for the first time since I got here,) and redial the phone number from my call log into the room phone. It's rotary, so my cell phone falls asleep halfway through when I'm trying to read the damn number and I'm worried that that delay will jinx the whole number, but it goes through. Or at least, I think it does until I hear the voice on the other end of the line.
"Hotel Caravel front desk," says the girl from reception. I curse and slam down the receiver. I dial the number again.
"Hotel Caravel front desk speaking," says the girl from reception. I curse again, and slam down the receiver. I dial the number again, this time from memory.
Now she's laughing. She's laughing at me. "Hotel Caravel... front desk... speaking," she says, in jolts between chuckles.
"Can you just tell me how to fucking dial a number that doesn't bring me to the fucking front desk?!" I yell at her.
"Sir," she laughs, "You really need to clamor down there."
"Just tell me," I plead.
"Zero first, sir."
"Thank you." I press the receiver button down with my free hand, then dial the same number for the fifth time. This time, it works.
“Welcome to EuroTrip Tours helpline. For more language options, please press 1. 日本語の場合は、2を押してください。. 要是你说中文，按三键 . Para português por favor, pressione 4. Para español, por favor, pulse 5. For menu options in English, please hold."
I have to navigate a menu on a rotary phone? Okay. Whatever. Wait. 3. 1. 2. 3. Another dial tone. They play me some hold music. They call my cell phone. They play me some fax noises. I still don't know why. I leave them both playing as I'm leaving blood on my bed and the carpet. What is happening?
“Hello? Hello???”
I’m startled out of a gargle-siren-induced haze by an actual voice on the landline. “Ugh. Yes. Hello.” I hang up my cellphone.
“Good evening and thank you for calling the EuroTrip Tours helpline, you are speaking with Esteban, how may I help you?”
The edge of bed where I’m sitting is just far away enough from the just-too-short reach of the phone’s earpiece, leaving me hunched over and irritatingly shy of a place to rest my elbows. “Yes, hello, this is Allen Lachlan, I’m on one of your tours, and your head office keeps trying to send a fax to my cellphone. I’m busy enough trying to settle in, and unintelligible shrieks aren’t helping.”
“I’m very sorry, I am not in contact with EuroTrip’s head office as they are outside office hours. If you can provide your Trippass access number however I may check your account for correspondences.”
“I don’t have an access number, and if I do it’s in my luggage, which went missing since I got on your tour bus from St Maine International Airport.”
“Hmmmmmmm.” I fight the urge to choke myself on the earpiece. “If this is the tour arrived today, Mister Lockling, then you should be calling from the Prestige-Fairmont Hotel —”
“I,” I avoid screaming, “have been housed elsewhere. That hotel was overbooked. And my name is Allen Lachlan, not ling.”
A pause, then: “My apologies, sir, I have found you on today’s intake and can confirm your Trippass number is 003507. Please keep this somewhere safe in case you wish to make inquiries in the future. Is there anything else I may help you with today?”
“Yes, actually. Can you please tell me why your head office is sending me faxes, and to tell them to stop.”
“I’m very sorry, sir, I cannot address your first inquiry however I may add alternative contact details to our database, so they may be sent to your hotel instead. May I please have your alternative contact number sir?”
"Uh, just give me a second," I say. When I first checked in the concierge gave me a slip of paper from a memo pad with some phone number scrawled on it, saying "here's the phone number," and now it's in my wallet which is on the nightstand so I take it out of my wallet and then I read it back over the phone.
"Very good, we'll send it right over. Thank you for touring with EuroTrip and we apologize once again for the inconvenience, sir."
"Thanks." I hang up. The receiver dings softly. I didn't notice that before. It's quaint.
I get up from the bed and rub the sides of my head. Somewhere amongst the unreasonable pressure I'm applying to my temples, I get the thought in my head that I should head out; go find a more substantial meal than this-wasn't-half-bad-what's-with-all-the-jokes-about-airline-food airline food.
I worry for my sanity.
This isn’t a vacation, this is as close to falling off the grid as it gets while still getting God damn phone calls. This isn’t the Emory Conference Hotel in Atlanta, for crying out loud, this is Europe! Three planes and half a day from civilisation! Six currencies! Twelve languages! Border disputes chugging along for decades like they’re just a fact of life and nobody would ever bother to tell you until you stepped on a landmine! Wolves, probably! Some people may take a push from HR to take a vacation as a reality check. Those people appreciate the externally-mandated call to re-evaluate their career, work-life balance, whatever, because those kinds (most kinds!) of people would never have it apropos of jack all cross their happy little minds to do so.
I like to think I’m ahead of the curve on this kind of thing. I, my career, my work-life-balance, my bank balance, my steadily-increasing sum of vacation days, all was accounted for and well until I left that travel agency with a folder full of tickets, itineraries, checklist of vaccinations, and a dreadful — nay, dreadsome — sense of inevitability.
Things will be well. All it hinges on is some personal discipline. Staying the course. A stiff upper lip, as I believe they call it on this side of the Atlantic. Two months will almost certainly feel like eternity if I’m conscientious about this, because the alternative is a 60 day whirlwind of sights and sounds and no time to steel myself for the mess my absence will doubtless have caused at the office.
The landline rings, breaking my train of thought. Wolves? I snap the receiver to my ear and just as quickly put it back down again. Those bastards are FAXING a ROTARY PHONE. I glance over to the note the concierge left me and dial the number on it.
Busy signal.
I gave them my room phone number. I gave them my room phone number, to send a fax to. As if on cue, my cell phone rings. It's also a fax.
On the rotary, I dial the EuroTrip support number without the 0, which brings me back to the front desk.
"Hotel Caravel front desk speaking," says the woman on the other side.
"What," I say, "is the phone number to your fax machine?"
I write it down on the same piece of paper my phone number is on. I go back through the jungle of the phone trees and wait on hold for another 97 hours. 003570. No wait, I mean 003507. It's pronounced Lachlan. Can you just stop sending the fax? Well, can you send it here? Great. Love you too! Bye.
I fall backwards onto my bed, exhausted. The ceilings in this place are suspended square tiles. Despite this, the ceiling fan seems pretty stable as the blades whip past. I wonder how fast they're going, if they could hurt me. I wonder what's hidden above that ceiling.
My eyes are peeled like potatoes, and that's when the phone rings. Both of them, at the same time.
Which phone, if either, do I answer?
The towel I wrapped my hand in is now a bloodied mess crumpled on the floor, which will definitely stain if I get distracted and leave it lying around. I tool around with the lever until it drains the now-cranberry vodka contents of the sink, grab a wad of toilet paper to press against my sliced-up hand, and toss the towel in the sink with a bar of soap.
It’s just as I get the right quantity of lukewarm flowing from the tap that my phone rings from the bedroom. Again.
I pick up my cell phone. "Yes, hel—" I yank it away from my ear on reflex. It's not a human voice. It' a horrible, screeching cacophony from outer space. Some idiot is trying to send a fax to my cell phone. Annoyed, I hang up.
It suddenly occurs to me: what if that call on my cell phone had merely been a distraction to get my back to the open window? I pocket my cellphone and swivel on my heels. No such misfortune, for now. Nevertheless, I proceed with caution back into the bathroom, keeping a special eye on the mirror. The running water masks my footsteps, but the same could apply to an intruder.
Nobody's there but me, Lachlan. I take a look at the fire escape handle, to see — astonishingly — that the window hasn't so much as budged. Before, I was worried it'd be too easy to open. Now, I'm worried that, in an actual emergency, I wouldn't be able to. I'm more careful this time. I take a washcloth out of the drawer and wrap it around the handle. I make sure the door is open behind me. I brace my left hand with my right. My cell phone rings. It's that awful noise again. I hang up immediately.
I simply can not stand for these interruptions every five seconds. I have to do something now, or I'll never be able to focus and get anything done at all. I fumble with my cell phone in wet hands and call the number right back.
"Hello! We see you're calling from an internationally roaming phone. If you have inquiries about your current tour, please input the six-digit Trippass number found on your e-itinerary. Or, call our regional —" I hang up. Why are they trying to fax my cell phone? I go back into the bedroom, sit on the bed (for the first time since I got here,) and redial the phone number from my call log into the room phone. It's rotary, so my cell phone falls asleep halfway through when I'm trying to read the damn number and I'm worried that that delay will jinx the whole number, but it goes through. Or at least, I think it does until I hear the voice on the other end of the line.
"Hotel Caravel front desk," says the girl from reception. I curse and slam down the receiver. I dial the number again.
"Hotel Caravel front desk speaking," says the girl from reception. I curse again, and slam down the receiver. I dial the number again, this time from memory.
Now she's laughing. She's laughing at me. "Hotel Caravel... front desk... speaking," she says, in jolts between chuckles.
"Can you just tell me how to fucking dial a number that doesn't bring me to the fucking front desk?!" I yell at her.
"Sir," she laughs, "You really need to clamor down there."
"Just tell me," I plead.
"Zero first, sir."
"Thank you." I press the receiver button down with my free hand, then dial the same number for the fifth time. This time, it works.
“Welcome to EuroTrip Tours helpline. For more language options, please press 1. 日本語の場合は、2を押してください。. 要是你说中文，按三键 . Para português por favor, pressione 4. Para español, por favor, pulse 5. For menu options in English, please hold."
I have to navigate a menu on a rotary phone? Okay. Whatever. Wait. 3. 1. 2. 3. Another dial tone. They play me some hold music. They call my cell phone. They play me some fax noises. I still don't know why. I leave them both playing as I'm leaving blood on my bed and the carpet. What is happening?
“Hello? Hello???”
I’m startled out of a gargle-siren-induced haze by an actual voice on the landline. “Ugh. Yes. Hello.” I hang up my cellphone.
“Good evening and thank you for calling the EuroTrip Tours helpline, you are speaking with Esteban, how may I help you?”
The edge of bed where I’m sitting is just far away enough from the just-too-short reach of the phone’s earpiece, leaving me hunched over and irritatingly shy of a place to rest my elbows. “Yes, hello, this is Allen Lachlan, I’m on one of your tours, and your head office keeps trying to send a fax to my cellphone. I’m busy enough trying to settle in, and unintelligible shrieks aren’t helping.”
“I’m very sorry, I am not in contact with EuroTrip’s head office as they are outside office hours. If you can provide your Trippass access number however I may check your account for correspondences.”
“I don’t have an access number, and if I do it’s in my luggage, which went missing since I got on your tour bus from St Maine International Airport.”
“Hmmmmmmm.” I fight the urge to choke myself on the earpiece. “If this is the tour arrived today, Mister Lockling, then you should be calling from the Prestige-Fairmont Hotel —”
“I,” I avoid screaming, “have been housed elsewhere. That hotel was overbooked. And my name is Allen Lachlan, not ling.”
A pause, then: “My apologies, sir, I have found you on today’s intake and can confirm your Trippass number is 003507. Please keep this somewhere safe in case you wish to make inquiries in the future. Is there anything else I may help you with today?”
“Yes, actually. Can you please tell me why your head office is sending me faxes, and to tell them to stop.”
“I’m very sorry, sir, I cannot address your first inquiry however I may add alternative contact details to our database, so they may be sent to your hotel instead. May I please have your alternative contact number sir?”
"Uh, just give me a second," I say. When I first checked in the concierge gave me a slip of paper from a memo pad with some phone number scrawled on it, saying "here's the phone number," and now it's in my wallet which is on the nightstand so I take it out of my wallet and then I read it back over the phone.
"Very good, we'll send it right over. Thank you for touring with EuroTrip and we apologize once again for the inconvenience, sir."
"Thanks." I hang up. The receiver dings softly. I didn't notice that before. It's quaint.
I get up from the bed and rub the sides of my head. Somewhere amongst the unreasonable pressure I'm applying to my temples, I get the thought in my head that I should head out; go find a more substantial meal than this-wasn't-half-bad-what's-with-all-the-jokes-about-airline-food airline food.
I worry for my sanity.
This isn’t a vacation, this is as close to falling off the grid as it gets while still getting God damn phone calls. This isn’t the Emory Conference Hotel in Atlanta, for crying out loud, this is Europe! Three planes and half a day from civilisation! Six currencies! Twelve languages! Border disputes chugging along for decades like they’re just a fact of life and nobody would ever bother to tell you until you stepped on a landmine! Wolves, probably! Some people may take a push from HR to take a vacation as a reality check. Those people appreciate the externally-mandated call to re-evaluate their career, work-life balance, whatever, because those kinds (most kinds!) of people would never have it apropos of jack all cross their happy little minds to do so.
I like to think I’m ahead of the curve on this kind of thing. I, my career, my work-life-balance, my bank balance, my steadily-increasing sum of vacation days, all was accounted for and well until I left that travel agency with a folder full of tickets, itineraries, checklist of vaccinations, and a dreadful — nay, dreadsome — sense of inevitability.
Things will be well. All it hinges on is some personal discipline. Staying the course. A stiff upper lip, as I believe they call it on this side of the Atlantic. Two months will almost certainly feel like eternity if I’m conscientious about this, because the alternative is a 60 day whirlwind of sights and sounds and no time to steel myself for the mess my absence will doubtless have caused at the office.
The landline rings, breaking my train of thought. Wolves? I snap the receiver to my ear and just as quickly put it back down again. Those bastards are FAXING a ROTARY PHONE. I glance over to the note the concierge left me and dial the number on it.
Busy signal.
I gave them my room phone number. I gave them my room phone number, to send a fax to. As if on cue, my cell phone rings. It's also a fax.
On the rotary, I dial the EuroTrip support number without the 0, which brings me back to the front desk.
"Hotel Caravel front desk speaking," says the woman on the other side.
"What," I say, "is the phone number to your fax machine?"
I write it down on the same piece of paper my phone number is on. I go back through the jungle of the phone trees and wait on hold for another 97 hours. 003570. No wait, I mean 003507. It's pronounced Lachlan. Can you just stop sending the fax? Well, can you send it here? Great. Love you too! Bye.
I fall backwards onto my bed, exhausted. The ceilings in this place are suspended square tiles. Despite this, the ceiling fan seems pretty stable as the blades whip past. I wonder how fast they're going, if they could hurt me. I wonder what's hidden above that ceiling.
My eyes are peeled like potatoes, and that's when the phone rings. Both of them, at the same time.
Which phone, if either, do I answer?