Wheels up at 7. Another busy solving day and largely driving.
I stuck a pallet truck in the back of the Luton, ratcheted to the side. There are three huge pallets and one small pallet. After the usual clueless fuckery, Tamara finds me. She’s the venue manager. She only needs the small one. I start talking to her in French but it turns out she’s from Devon. She gets me to the right place but there’s no loading bay so there I am already soaking wet before nine ayem trying to maneuver a loaded pallet truck onto the tail lift without dumping the contents or looking like a prat. Fifty percent is still a pass in exams these days. The contents remained undumped. I frequently look like a prat and don’t particularly mind.
First load signed off. Now I’ve got to get to The Sheraton hotel loading bay under Charles de Gaulle airport. I stop at the warehouse on the way and go and badger poor Curtis for the correct accreditation because oops. Getting into airports is hard enough when there isn’t a major event happening. I know I’m gonna need to be on point for this one. We sort it.
Everything works. I needed that printout. I get into the airport. It’s a maze under there. My instructions are in French and obscure at best. I make it to the bay and there’s a guy in it taking his time in a tiny van. There’s a queue of cars already behind me and we are in a narrow tunnel where I have to block them until he has vacated the bay. He’s in animated fun conversation and in no hurry. Honk honk honk. Not me but at him. Eventually the bay clears and I pull in to unload.
Nobody is at work yet for the drop off. They’re all having breakfast in the Sheraton. Karim the concierge though proves an absolute gem. Anglophone and Anglophile, we slip into my favourite language dynamic, where we both practice speaking the unfamiliar language. He is talkative and receptive and he helps me bypass the fact I’ve been given an incorrect contact number. The company I’m dropping for are caught napping. I suddenly have about twenty enthusiastic young french people with their Olympic hats and t-shirts, all descending on my van. I know people and companies like this so well from other events. There’s nothing they can do here to help but they want to because they’re on an adventure.
Three huge pallets and one pallet truck to unload. Lots of happy friendly people but nobody hench and no other pallet trucks so I’m on my own. A pallet truck is basically one of those manual forklift trolleys like they take the lost arc on in the final shot of raiders. We’ve all arrived at this way of transporting goods in bulk that involves a timber frame, a huge stack of stuff, and it’s all wrapped up in clingfilm.
As I haul the pallets, the corridors are lined with happy young french people. They are opening doors and moving chairs, summoning lifts and smiling benignly. Getting in the way as often as they are helping. It’s like I’m an Olympian. Pallet Shifting through the delighted crowds. It wasn’t my special skill a week ago. It still isn’t now. Always learning.
Two nice drop offs and I’m on the way back when I’m told that the guys at Grand Palais haven’t got their two extra banners. Same venue I couldn’t get into last time. I’m nice. Instead of lunch, I drop off the Luton and swap to a transit that has been pre loaded with their banners. An hour through awful traffic to get them there. They were due at half one which was when I got the call. I know how to get to the gate now and I’m feeling pretty pleased with myself when I get there.
Bob is waiting outside the gate with a guy who looks like roadkill. Bob is effete and groomed with a very French air of pomposity that likely outweighs his competence. Roadkill walks in two directions simultaneously, is completely bald and has been cooked to cinders by endless outdoor labour. Bob’s a shrugger. Roadkill’s a mugger. I’m happy to be solving problems. My mood is about to change. I forget that these guys just think I’m the inexplicably English delivery driver who had bad accreditation yesterday.
I catch Bob’s eye and shout his name smiling as I approach the gate. He and roadkill come up to the door. Roadkill snatches my accreditation out of my hand and goes to the back of the van to try open it. I’m still in a busy road. I haven’t been through security. Alexandre comes to the door. He’s huge and funny and we share a name, but he still needs to see my accreditation. I’m in the middle of the road and I was yesterday’s panic for them. Roadkill has got my accreditation. “We need to see your accreditation,” say two anxious people in hi-vis. “Hallo Alexander!” bellows Alexandre through the fence. “I hope it works this time!” “Open the back now we want them now,” says Bob. “That man has my accreditation,” I say to the security about Roadkill who seems to think that if he stands behind my van in the road it’ll open. HONK go the cars I’m blocking. “Just open the back,” says Bob. “We have been waiting here for two and a half hours,” says Bob in English. “I know,” I tell him. That’s why I’m here you idiot, I think. Then “That man has my accreditation,” I tell security. Roadkill is avoiding my gaze, fannying around trying to break into the van. “I have nothing, what are you talking about” says Roadkill, even though he has my accreditation in his pocket. “Open the back,” he demands in French. “You can’t stop here without accreditation,” shouts the security guard. “Just open the back,” tries Passive Bob again in English.
I think I said but this venue is at the north end of Les Invalides bridge. Traffic is absolutely crazy crazy crazy. I’ve worked out a good route that bypasses about twenty minutes on Google maps but it is still rammed and traffic is going every which way.
“I’m not going to unload my cargo in the road on the public side, I only did it last time because I had to and I was parked tight. I’m going through security this time because these guys at the gate will freak out every time they see me if I don’t get cleared. I’m gonna be here loads so we need to get this system working. What the bitch are you doing mobbing me before I’m even through security?” Bob comes close to my face. “We have been waiting for two and half hours,” he enunces like an angry Scottish grandmother. “I know,” I tell him. “That’s why I’m here. Now give me back my fucking pass?” Roadkill looks blank. Bob shrugs. “Ok, you’re all going to have to wait while I bring up my email because one of these two men has my accreditation in their pocket.” “Honk,” go the cars. “Just open the back,” goes Bob. I ostentatiously bring up my phone and ignore all the noise. A security guard pulls my attention: “Sir you have to show your pass.” I’m still just about calm. “One of these men has my pass and is pretending not to. I’m going to have to find my copy on email.” Roadkill hears this and responds, finally. He only speaks French – as a matter of practice – but I have been only speaking French but for a few more detailed spats with Bob, who is a prat. If he was willing to be patient towards the unknown for once in his life I think I would get on with Roadkill. Within that, Bob would be and will always remain a prat. Bob shouts “Bob” when Beyonce asks “Who run the world?”
Roadkill pulls my crumpled pass from his pocket where he stuffed it. He is looking me in the eye as he does so. I flashback to school. He is the guy I needed to contact yesterday. He is the guy I needed to contact today. He said to me on the phone yesterday “I can’t be bothered talking with English people.” I’m in his country working, but with a modicum of patience I can communicate efficiently with people who have no English. Like a knife it occurs to me: he’s making it hard on purpose cuz I’m English. Bless.
He reluctantly gives my crumpled pass from his pocket to security. He looks into my eyes defiantly as he does it. “I can do what I like with your stuff,” his look tells me.
I’m in French-head. Instinct brings me to say “va te faire foutre” which is schoolboy go fuck yourself. It’s the best I’ve got. It’s nice to say a schoolboy swear and mean it.
Security beep the pass he tried to hide and everyone is genuinely surprised it checks out.
“You see that name?” – this is Roadkill pointing to the name written on my consignment. He’s peacock now. “That’s me. That name is me. I’m Matthieu Lastname”.
“I’m Al Barclay,” I respond, shaking his familiarly gnarly hand. “You need to check your phone more often,” I add in English, smiling and nodding. He won’t.
“We were waiting for two and a half hours,” says Bob again in English. He has sidled up and is trying to impress the boss. “I was doing other things,” I tell him in English. “My job is to solve problems. You had a problem. I solved it. Don’t come to me about your slow delivery, that’s nothing to do with me. And tell Matthieu to check his phone from time to time.” Bob doesn’t look happy. He’s gearing up for more shrugging and he is GOOD at shrugging. His facial hair is twitching.
“SIR YOU HAVE TO DRIVE THROUGH THE GATE.” Security. It is open! Roadkill is still barking: “Just open the back door!” “HONK” goes the traffic.
I drive through the gate. I stop and open the back of the van. We are now safe. Security has determined that they aren’t going to take two boxes of explosives. This is why we have security Matthieu me old mucker. (A note regarding Roadkill: I usually really get on with outdoor working badly socialised angry but intensely practical misfits. He does his thing extremely well. But we don’t like each other in this instance.)
Alexandre barrels up now, because I’m legally back to where I was yesterday when everything exploded. “It worked, Alexander, your pass worked!” He’s both happy and surprised. I’m so over it. I think he’s one of my favourite people, Alexandre. He’s good at his job in a venue full of morons. Likely these idiots will need something from me before close of play. I’m gonna make sure they know they can use me. I’m not proud. I’ll do things for potatoes. We all just want this event to be brilliant.
I open the back of the van for Bob and Matthieu. They take a while to get onto site to where the van can stop. “Where the hell are those idiots”, I ask Alexandre. “They’re in such a hurry they want me to unload in the road and now they’ve vanished.” But of course they are clearing accreditation. I like to think the security staff were making it harder for them on purpose. Neither of them strike me as the type to win friendship from security. Bob reckons he’s the business. Roadkill is practical but his dnd roll is 4 Charisma. It’s a decent partnership. Smug manicured shruggy git who speaks some English, remote controlled by squat angry prune who speaks none.
They get their banners and off they trot with veiled threats. How fucking dare I be English. They really aren’t happy that I dropped all my jobs to take on their dropped job. Imagine if I hadn’t? They would still be waiting now. They don’t know how to check WhatsApp or email. It must be hard being a potato.
By this time I’ve been driving or loading for a pretty much constant 9 hours, barring a quick wee and making Curtis send me things. It’s another hour back to the depot. Then just bits and bobs so generally a pretty pleasant day, just with a few adult children who are in over their heads.
Loved ones have fallen foul of this thing. The French have a deep vein of insularity and protectionism. They don’t like foreigners. I’m a good mimic and have had time in this country, and I know that in a week I’ll likely be able to pass if I am spare with my speech. But Roadkill and Bob know I’m a gaijin and they don’t like gaijin and somehow that’s more important than just doing the fucking job.
I’m ok with putting up with it. As a nation we are arguably even worse than they are. I know I’m working here like this because I am skilled in such work. It involves being responsive and positive, and so long as there are no eejits breathing down your neck you can achieve a great deal in a short space of time. “It’s about the work,” as my old voice teacher used to say. And that goes for every walk of life. I get it now: “Live like a Frenchman but work like an Englishman” Great food, but your personal bits get in the way of big pictures…tant pis
AlBarclay 