To begin with I really am the least informed person to comment on this since I don’t even like beer but please, beer for breakfast? This phenomenon is common enough at airports, although I confess I still don’t get it. I am pretty sure these people don’t get up on a Saturday at home, wonder into the kitchen, open the fridge and pour themselves a nice long draught of lager to go with their corn flakes. Even if they did it would be probably be nearer to opening time rather than last nights closing time. However, off on their holidays to Tenerife or Majorca you quite often see these people in the international departures holding pen nursing a pint at the Witherspoons surrounded by 20th century kitsch. Even then we could give these people the benefit of the doubt since they are on the international side of security. They’ve just flown twelve hours from Bangkok to London. Their body clocks say the pub has just opened even if the local clocks stand mute on the subject. There is another 2 hours before their next connection leaves so why not, go on, have an alcoholic beverage, it helps the deep vein thrombosis. Picture if you will though the bleak scene at Manchester International Airport, portal to the world for international men of mystery such as yours truly. To make my flight for Singapore I was up at 5.00 am, picked up at 6.00 am and delivered to the airport easily by 7.00 am. Even before I go through security the local is filled with holiday makers, not just Chavs but couples deeply engrossed in their silences, her with her Campari and Lemonde and him with his Bodingtons. Why? Why is that fun at 7.00 in the morning in a pub with the atmosphere of a decompression chamber with a fruit machine and some folk art screwed to the wall? Did I mention it is 7.00 in the morning and still dark outside?
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Manchester Airport |
