Over The Hills and Far Away

The Koru Club is reassuringly empty with only half an hour to go until boarding. I hope this means an empty flight and a vacant seat or two beside me. I'm not flying business class this time and I have had some tedious flights in the past. For readers of my Facebook page, todays comment wasn't entirely fictitious. On a trip to Los Angeles once I mentioned my profession by way of conversation. For the next eleven hours I was held personally responsible for the crusades and for the various heinous crimes committed by various Christians against my seat mate, his family and his family's family even unto the seventh Generation. Next time I flew the same route I was less than honest. When asked what I did to put bread on the table I almost truthfully said that I was a teacher. Whereupon I found myself in an increasingly convoluted, decreasingly honest conversation about educational policy, pedagogy, Piaget and my views of the same. After that I scowled and mumbled. I'm good at that. So tonight I'm hoping for a lovely empty seat.

I'm not one of the worlds great travelers. Going to a place merely because it's a long way away and I've never been there before holds little appeal and I have no interest at all in getting my picture taken in front of famous bits of architecture. My iPad tells me it's -1 degrees in London at the moment and there are a lot of things back home clamoring for my attention; so I'm sitting here without a huge amount of enthusiasm. I'm going to England to learn how to be a bishop. St. John's College gave a very generous grant for me to educate myself in episcopacy and when I saw this course advertised about eight months ago, I jumped at it as a way of relieving myself of the burden of what to do with the money. Eight months rolls around pretty fast, and here I am, in the Auckland Koru lounge eating chickpea and coriander soup and hoping for a downturn in Air New Zealand's profit margin, at least for tonight.
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Comments

Anonymous said…

I'm willing to bet 20 novenas that when you get there, you'll be drawn in to the course by exactly the same factors that catch your interest in any situation you've found yourself in. Never mind the architechture; he tangata, he tangata he tangata. I await your conclusions with interest - and please give my love to the boss when you see him. Jo

31 January 2011 at 14:20

Lee said…

But of course it's all your fault! How could things that happened hundreds of years ago NOT be???

*shakes head*

Sometimes you have to wonder.

I hope you got a nice, empty flight :-)

2 February 2011 at 20:58

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