Above is the last picture i have of Rainer ...my last post left us off with the Kidderminster Lions leaving us and that is Ben Mitchell above enjoying his Chinese take away food which was directly across the street from where we were .... when the guys had to head off to catch their train to Birmingham we decided to go to the steak house next door ... my treat !
Now remember we have been drinking beer all day and we now had to go get our bags and head to the airport . I distinctly remember telling Rainer "lets go to this steak house eat some food to sober up and go get our bags , i will pay " apparently he did not understand . When we got in the steak house it was kinda swank with families and tourists there , the prices were not cheap either and it is in the heart of Oxford Circus smack dab in the middle of London . I ordered us an appetizer of chicken wings which were amazing and got a cola , Rainer asked for wine and water ... then he asked the waitress to mix the 2 for him and put it in a bigger glass , when she brought the glass he asked if he could have a bigger glass ... now you have to know the only thing bigger would have been a fish bowl , this was a pretty big glass of wine !
I remember telling him come on buddy just have the one glass and sober up , but he did not want to sober up . He ordered another glass by yelling out OLA CHIKA bring me more wine .... and then began to talk to the 3 Norwegian women at the next table , they were not interested in talking to him and then the circus began :( i ordered a big juicy steak and he ordered calamari ??? yeah forget eating just nibble and oh yeah 1 more glass of wine !!! He drank about a half a bottle of wine in the time that i ate my steak and i had to apologize to basically everyone we passed and even had to ask the waitress to cut him off . I payed our bill and told Rainer lets go and he just sat there for about 15 minutes before i came back inside to gather him .
So we walk over to the underground station and i use my oyster card to get through the gates he waves his card ,the gate opens ...he throws his hands up in the air and walks towards the top up station , honestly i timed this and i stood there watching him fiddle with all the machines for 20 minutes during this time i was calling him over to come through the gate and he was not responding . Next thing you know he just walks out of the station and up the stairs ??? ok so now i have to leave , run up the stairs and chase him down !!! When i get up the stairs i see him crossing the street and i yell out RAINER !!! he turns around squints at me and a bus pulls up in front of him ( honestly this is not a movie it is totally true ) .... i am trying to look around the bus and as it leaves i run across the street only to find that he is gone !!! disappeared , i run around looking around every corner for him for about 15 minutes then i decide its best that i go to the hostel .....
Was really hoping he would be there , now i am not sure to this day if he got onto that bus or if he just popped into a pub but regardless i am freaking out . When i get to the hostel he is not there and i ask to check out my bag and ask if i can wait around for my friend , they said yes but not too long . Now that i am not a paying customer they don't care about me but then again they didn't care about me when i was paying ... i begin to sober up and think ahead and figure if i take his bag A) i can't take 2 bags on RyanAir B) if i take his bag and he does not show i have his passport then he is totally screwed , so i decide to grab his keys out of his bag as my sticks and some other stuff is in his car out front of his friends house ( Michael ) whom i have no contact with ....so i sit and wait and begin sending out messages to people just in case Rainer does not show .
Midnight approaches and the hostel staff tell me you must go ! It is pissing rain outside and the transit is pretty much shut down at this time , i have to get to my bus at Baker Station to get to airport . The bus ticket i have is for both of us so if he is not there then he has to find his own way , if i miss this bus then i am up the creek too . I had to walk by Hyde Park and it was dark and i was soaked and pretty much lost aside from the soaked tourist map i was handling , not exactly in a good mood either at this point . It takes me 1 hour to find Baker Station by walk from my hostel and when i get there the bus is waiting but it is not my bus !!! i had to run to catch the bus 3 blocks over and i ran like the wind as the next bus was not for another hour and i was not about to stand in the rain for another hour . When i got there the bus was full ! i showed him my ticket and said look i paid to be on this bus at this time look at the paper and he moved someone into the front for me .... yeah i was straight forward and got what i paid for and honestly there was no way he was leaving me on the street , at this point i would have hijacked the bus :)
So Rainer never showed at hostel , missed bus and hopefully will show up at the airport . i slept on the bus and this was about the only sleep i was about to get .... when i got to airport i paid for some wifi service and decided to call the hostel to see if Rainer got his bag . No he didn't , this was roughly 2:15 AM .... at 3:30 AM i called again and they said he got his bag around 3 AM and was taking a taxi to meet me !!! ok he has a chance if he just pays the taxi :) Now i am still freaking out emailing and messaging people to find my way from Memmingen airport to Michaels and find a way to get my equipment from Andreas then i need to find somewhere to spend the night and get to Munich for my flight home on Monday .... yeah i was freaking out hard core !
90 minutes until flight leaves and i decide to lineup to clear security , i have Rainers printed out RyanAir ticket :( if he does not show it will cost him 60 Euros to print out the stupid ticket ... yeah it is bullshit but that's the way it is ! So when i get to the counter i explain that i have my friends ticket and if i could leave it at the desk for him and they say no ! when and if he shows up he will have to pay ... can't do anything to help so i just hand over my ticket and go through security ... went to sit down near the gate and honestly every person that came around the corner i eyeballed hoping they were Rainer but to no avail , he was not going to show and i had to board the plane .......
stay tuned for the conclusion , this story is just too crazy to write down all at once :)
No comments:
Post a Comment