I Won't Be Home For Christmas

by Amanda Prowse

  By the final couple of hours of the flight she was beginning to feel a bit antsy. The excitement had all but disappeared and the seat, which had seemed okay for the first few hours, now seemed restrictive and small. The cabin was either too hot or too cold and she longed to breathe clean, unfiltered air and to stand up straight and have a proper walk around. She could tell by the way Ellen was fidgeting that she felt the same.

  But pretty soon it was nearly time to land. She restored her table and seatbelt and scooped up their combined litter for the cool, smiling flight attendant with her hungry bin liner. As the plane began its descent, Ellen leant over her to look out of the window. ‘God, we’re a bit close to the sea – and those buildings!’ She pointed across Vivienne at the long, low warehouse-type structures that skirted the edge of the water.

  ‘I’m sure they’ve done this a million times before. Just sit back, it’ll be okay.’ Vivienne hid her own nervousness to try and keep her friend calm, unwilling to admit that her heart was also racing at the sight of the blocks of flats so close to the airport, and the mountains, which at one point had appeared to be within touching distance of the plane.

  The landing, however, was faultless.

  ‘Jesus H. Christ, that was a bit hairy!’ Ellen clearly regretted having looked out of the window.

  A surge of excitement saw them giggle their way off the plane, from where the travellator transported them to arrivals. Without bags to collect, they were unencumbered for their fourteen hours in Hong Kong. The airport was white, sparkling and dust-free; the place gleamed. It was busy, yet well laid out with big wide open lounges that meant it didn’t feel crowded. It was quite something to see the airport signs written in Cantonese with English translations underneath, but in many other ways the inside of the airport looked remarkably similar to Heathrow, though Vivienne wasn’t sure what she had expected. She felt a frisson of both excitement and fear at the prospect of leaving the safety of the airport and venturing out into this strange country that was halfway round the world from all that was familiar.

  ‘Good Lord, Viv, look at them flats!’ Ellen pointed. ‘All piled together, so cramped, and the windows are tiny.’ She gave a running commentary in her usual style on the apartment blocks they could see from inside the terminal.

  ‘I’m sure they’re lovely inside.’ Vivienne didn’t know what else to say to compensate for her friend’s lack of tact, so she quickly changed the subject. ‘Right, we have to be back here in fourteen hours ready to make our connection, so we need to keep an eye on how long it takes us to get to wherever we’re going, then we’ll know to leave that much time on the way back.’

  ‘Good thinking.’ Ellen nodded and hitched her large raffia beach bag up onto her shoulder. She smiled at her friend who looked ready for a day on the beach not a stint exploring Hong Kong.

  The two joined the throng of people exiting the terminal and followed the signs for the bus station. They had no idea where they were going, but figured that if they followed the crowd they couldn’t go far wrong. The first thing that struck them when they walked out onto the remarkably clean concourse was the temperature. It might only have been early morning in Hong Kong, but the sky was clear blue and the ground radiated heat.

  ‘Flippin’ ’eck!’ Ellen pumped the front of her T-shirt. ‘It’s hot, Viv!’

  She nodded. It was.

  To the left of the exit was the surprisingly small ticket office. An elderly Chinese lady, her face a beautiful lattice of creases and wrinkles, sat behind a single glass screen wearing an expression that could best be described as sour. Her mouth puckered, as if she was already furious at the world. It did not bode well.

  Vivienne had to prise her tongue from the roof of her mouth, nervous at having to try and engage, praying the woman spoke at least a little English. ‘Hello.’ She smiled, but there was no response. ‘We need to get a bus into town?’ She spoke slowly, using her hand to mimic a fish swimming along – why, she wasn’t sure, but it was all she could think of at the time.

  The old lady responded in a rapid fire of Cantonese, gesturing over Vivienne’s head, clearly angry and frustrated at the foreign woman who was making fish signs at her while a queue of impatient passengers, all of whom had places to be, formed behind her.

  ‘Probably thinks you want sushi. What’s that all about?’ Ellen mimicked her hand signal.

  ‘I don’t know! I just panicked a bit. I was trying to show her that we need to travel.’

  ‘What, by river or log flume? Let me have a go.’ Ellen elbowed her friend to one side and placed her raffia bag on the counter, staring at the old woman, deaf to the shouts of those behind her who were clutching coins in the heat and trying to board one of the many buses that sat in a chevron formation along the kerb.

  Ellen held up two fingers. ‘Two tickets,’ she shouted, ‘for…’ She then made as if she was holding a cup and saucer and tipped the imaginary cup to her mouth. ‘And…’ She then mimed eating very quickly, as if her hands were gripping cutlery and shoving food into her mouth. ‘In…’ She drew a tall rectangle with her index fingers and made a pyramid with her hands to show a roof.

  The woman yelled back, firing off a volley of incomprehensible sounds and unfathomable words, as if she was furious, waving her hand and angrily smacking her gums. However, she did also print off two cardboard tickets, which she pushed under the little grille at the bottom of the glass window. Ellen shoved the requisite Hong Kong dollars by way of return and the two friends made their way over to the buses, laughing and leaning against each other, as much out of relief as anything else.

  ‘It’s much easier when we go up the mall, isn’t it?’ Vivienne laughed as Ellen, buoyed by her ticket-purchase success, went ahead to figure out which was their bus.

  ‘Thing is, Elle, we’ve managed to get two tickets, but we have no idea where we’re heading. Could be anywhere!’

  ‘Well, aren’t you Little Miss Sunshine! I figure as long as lots of other people are on the bus, we can’t go far wrong.’

  ‘But they could be going anywhere. A family wedding, a funeral!’ A wave of anxiety washed through her.

  ‘This is our adventure, Viv. We shall just have to make the most of wherever we end up. Now let’s get on a bloody bus. A funeral!’ She tutted under her breath.

  Taking seats at the back with a good view, Vivienne pressed her face against the slightly smeared glass on the less than pristine vehicle and marvelled at the sharp-peaked mountains on the horizon.

  ‘Bit uncomfy, isn’t it?’ Ellen shifted on the barely sprung seats that gave the bus the feel of an old coach, the kind that had once taken them on school trips. She nudged Vivienne. ‘Do you remember when we went to Bristol Zoo and you wet yourself?’

  Vivienne glanced round to see if any English-speakers might have heard her gobby friend. ‘I did not wet myself.’

  ‘You did so! I remember it. You had to put on Nicola Brown’s gym knickers that they found in a carrier bag.’

  ‘Well that’s you getting old and your memory playing tricks. You’re right, I did have to put on Nicola Brown’s gym knickers, but it was because I tipped my Ribena over my summer dress. I didn’t wet myself.’ She sat up straight in the seat.

  ‘Ribena, wee, same difference.’ Ellen shrugged.

  ‘Not when you have to drink it, Elle.’

  And just like that, they were back to snorting and giggling.

  Vivienne pointed out of the window. ‘This is quite something, isn’t it – look at the tower blocks.’

  Ellen leaned over until they were both staring out of the window, taking in the narrow, soaring high-rises in the distance, lined up in rows like monochrome dominoes, unappealing to look at, with tiny windows dotted uniformly all over them. The matchstick buildings sat incongruously against a stunning backdrop of early-morning sun, the golden orb shimmering from behind the dark grey mountains.

  The road twisted, climbed and dropped, until the landscape altered and they were driving alongs
ide a port. But for the sunshine, it could almost have been Avonmouth, a vast, faceless tract of reclaimed land, busy with forklift trucks and cranes, where vast ships loaded and unloaded containers behind secure gates and checkpoints. Both women were quiet now, neither wanting to admit to the fear that their bus could indeed be heading anywhere. Vivienne felt her friend shift closer to her on the seat. Both were clutching their bags on their laps.

  ‘Polo?’ Ellen whispered as she reached into her bag, extracting the little foil-wrapped tube and peeling open the end. Vivienne nodded and both sucked on the sharp, hot mints; they were a little bit of home that brought a smidgen of comfort in the alien landscape.

  Their trepidation eased, as the bus veered onto a multi-lane road, clearly aiming for the city that loomed in the distance.

  ‘Hong Kong!’ Vivienne raised her shoulders and beamed at her friend. Sighting the skyscrapers in the distance, the functional bridges over motorways, the throng of cars, lorries, buses and bicycles all carrying people and goods towards the city suddenly made it real. They had arrived.

  Removing her camera from her handbag, Vivienne remembered the lesson hastily delivered by Aaron and switched it on, waiting for the little green light as instructed. It was then a simple case of pointing and shooting and this she did with enthusiasm. She snapped away, capturing the yellow overhead road signs that blazed the way to Central, North Point and Kowloon, and then turning her attention to the shops with their rooftop Coca-Cola signs and the beautiful script of Chinese characters below.

  Her eye was drawn to a crocodile of approximately twenty schoolgirls, no older than six or seven, who were marching parallel to the road. Treading the dusty pavement in lilac-and-black tartan kilts, immaculate short-sleeved white shirts and matching tartan ribbons crossed under their collars, they held hands in pairs. They wore “Hello Kitty” backpacks between their shoulder blades and their neat, blunt bobs were either fastened with hairclips to create a fringe or tied into two chunky bunches either side of a neat parting. Two little girls at the back of the group whispered to each other and threw their heads back, laughing; finding themselves out of step with their classmates, they had to run to catch up. Vivienne turned to Ellen and smiled, her meaning clear. Remind you of anyone?

  The roads were so congested that the bus snaked along slowly, giving her the perfect opportunity to peer down side streets, which were alive with activity even at this early hour. Men and women in grey overalls swept the streets with wide, wooden brooms. Battered trucks and lorries with heavy loads listed towards the kerb, as slight boys in grubby white vests, jeans rolled above the ankle and nothing more substantial than flip-flops on their feet wheeled heavily laden porters’ trolleys back and forth. They transported everything – sealed cardboard boxes, crates of pop, stacks of raw materials – from the lorries and vans to the myriad of tiny shops and factories that were crammed inside the rabbit warren of alleyways. Everywhere she looked, people humped boxes on their shoulders or in outstretched arms. Stock was pushed along on rickety trolleys and everything from fresh produce to livestock disappeared into the corridors between the buildings and along the narrow hallways inside. She longed to glimpse the secret world behind the battered concrete facades.

  Businessmen in suits emerged like film extras from hidden doors to hop onto buses and into cabs, and schoolchildren and siblings held hands as they made their way to the nearest underpass or Metro station. She looked up and gasped at the thirty or forty floors of apartments that sat atop the ground-floor buildings. Multiple flats and rooms were crammed in at all angles, their windows thrown open, some with prison-like bars, others with airers clipped to the frames and lines of clothes drying in the dusty morning heat. Elderly men propped themselves against the sills, cigarettes held between long fingernails, as they greeted the morning. Other windows revealed women in bubble-gum coloured overalls leaning far out, shouting exchanges to neighbours in the flats opposite, whose postures mirrored theirs. From a window high above, someone shook a duvet, sending tiny feathers fluttering down below; higher still, there was a cage with a pot inside it, fighting for space next to a clunking, rusted air-conditioning unit, and a plant grew up between and over the bars.

  ‘Well I never, Viv.’ Ellen stared and pointed at a window at their eye level, through which they could see metal bunk-beds jammed against a wall, clothes on hangers draped all around the window frame and narrow shelves on the wall holding all manner of toiletries and a couple of framed photos. It made Vivienne feel thankful for her three-bedroomed house in Mendip Road: more space than she would ever need, even if Emma thought it was crappy.

  ‘Crowded, isn’t it?’ Ellen stated the obvious.

  Vivienne nodded, wondering if it still felt crowded if it was all you knew or whether you simply shrank to fit your environment.

  The bus pulled over and disgorged a third of the passengers, some of whom immediately placed paper surgical masks over their noses and mouths, securing them with thin elastic looped over their ears, before heading off on foot.

  ‘Why do they wear them masks? Do you think they’re sick?’ Ellen asked.

  ‘Not sure. I guess it’s easier to catch things when you’re living this close together, or it might be because of pollution.’

  ‘Do you think we should get some?’ Ellen sounded worried.

  ‘Don’t think we’ll be here long enough for it to matter. Besides we breathe in diesel fumes in Bedminster twenty-four seven at home.’ She gave a wry smile.

  ‘When are we getting off?’

  Vivienne noticed that her gobby friend was now the one asking questions, not quite so keen to take the lead in this alien place. ‘I reckon the next stop, then we should go and find a cup of coffee, what do you think?’

  ‘I think yes. Wouldn’t say no to one of Pedro’s teacakes right now.’ She smiled.

  ‘Hope Bob’s okay,’ Vivienne said, thinking aloud.

  ‘He’ll be having the time of his life.’ Ellen sounded certain. ‘Feels like we’ve been gone forever already, doesn’t it?’

  Vivienne nodded. It did. Time was already out of kilter. Her body had no idea if it was noon or night. She pictured Emma passing through these streets and other places like it and for the first time she understood the fascination, the appeal of arriving somewhere you had never been before, somewhere that meant you had to keep your wits about you, where everything was a challenge, even just getting from A to B. And where you could be anything you wanted to be because no one knew who you were or where you had come from.

  As the bus pulled into a more commercial part of town, Vivienne grabbed her friend’s arm. ‘Come on!’

  They rattled down the aisle, thanked their driver, who acknowledged the universal wave of gratitude, and got off. They found themselves on a clean, white pavement without a dot of litter or stroke of graffiti, very different to their own city. Fancy shop windows with classy displays boasting names like Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Breitling and Jimmy Choo were just as intimidating to them in Hong Kong, as they were in any shopping centre back home. The shops seemed to have made minimal concessions to the Christmas season; there was just the odd sprig of fresh holly in a carefully positioned handbag, and a couple of champagne flutes with coils of shiny foil ribbon coming out of them – more general-purpose celebration than UK-style Christmas decorations.

  As the two of them stood there, looking upwards and taking in the sights, they felt a bit lost in the sea of people, who all appeared to be walking with purpose. Vivienne clutched her handbag and stared admiringly at the shoppers strolling past them, slender women with diamond-cut cheekbones, geometric haircuts and pale, unblemished skin hidden behind oversized sunglasses and designer silk scarves tied at the neck in jaunty styles.

  Ellen breathed in through her nose. ‘It’s funny, isn’t it, if you closed your eyes and couldn’t hear anything, just the smell would let you know you weren’t in England.’

  Vivienne inhaled. Ellen was right. The air was warm, of course, but it was also tinge
d with the woody scent of perfume, the tang of spicy food, cooking oil and diesel, and even the vaguest hint of sea salt.

  ‘There are lots of Chinese people here, aren’t there?’ Ellen observed.

  Vivienne ignored her, unable to think of an appropriate response that wouldn’t involve sarcasm or invoke an even louder response.

  But Ellen wasn’t done. ‘It’s weird, because I am with all these foreigners and yet I am the foreigner! This must be what it felt like for Ying Soo for all those years at Parson Street Primary.’

  ‘Yes, probably.’ Vivienne recalled the shy girl, the only Chinese girl in their class, who liked to be left to her own devices.

  ‘Do you think people are looking at us and thinking we look different?’

  ‘I think they’re looking at us and thinking, God, that blonde one has a loud voice.’

  Ellen poked her tongue out at her friend. ‘Right then, I won’t talk to you at all.’

  ‘Amen to that.’ Vivienne raised her eyes skyward.

  ‘You don’t mean that – you’d miss my chat.’

  ‘You see, you can’t be quiet for five seconds!’

  ‘I can,’ she snapped.

  There was a pause of a second or two before Ellen drew breath. ‘I could do with the loo,’ she whispered.

  Vivienne laughed. ‘I could do with a nap,’ she confessed.

  ‘You can cut that out – we’ve got a whole day to kill first. Let’s get you coffee’d up, that’ll give you some energy.’

  ‘Hope so.’ Turning sharply to look behind her, Vivienne saw the familiar Starbucks sign and pointed to it.

  They made their way through the throng of people. Inside, rather disappointingly, it looked like any Starbucks anywhere. She didn’t know what she had hoped for, but certainly not the homogeneous familiarity that took the edge off her adventure. She could get paper cups, Frappuccino mocha lattes, icing-coated buns and sticky table tops anywhere.