Mis-adventures

I went down to Sydney in the weekend for my friend Svetadvipa's wedding. He and his fiancee Manjulali were married in a Hare Krishna ceremony at a beach just north of Sydney.

It rocked, and the reception was pretty good. I ate four pieces of this awesome cheesecake they had there.

It came time to leave, and I had to head to the airport to catch my flight out to Brisbane. I'd taken my sandals off during the ceremony, and when I went to retrieve them, I found they were gone!

Doh!

It's 5.30pm on a Saturday afternoon. Where am I going to find footwear in Sydney at this hour? Of course it wouldn't be a big deal except that they won't let you on a plane with no shoes, at least thongs (aussie for flip flops).

"No worries mate!" says my mate Mangala from NZ, who had come over for the wedding and was driving me to the airport. "We can stop off in the Cross and get something on the way!"

"The Cross" is King's Cross, Sydney's red light district. Hey, I'm sure you can get anything you want there, at any time of the day, if you just know where to go and who to ask.

Next comes a mad dash across town in the fading light and Mangala's fading memories of Sydney's roads. "Man, it's completely changed since I was here last" he laments as we do another U-turn to a chorus of blaring horns. Remembering his earlier reminiscences of watching Angus Young from AC/DC kicking bottles off the bar in a small pub back in 1979 I'm not surprised.

We finally get to the Cross, with the clock ticking. The adrenaline is pumping. I'm in my element - a crisis!

With a keen awareness of the clock and the challenge of finding the way to the airport in time I run barefoot down the road of a likely looking stretch of the Cross. Plenty of food joints, bars, bottle shops, adult shops, massage parlours, but pretty slim pickings for footwear.

Finally we locate a place - it's a small Internet joint run by a Chinese family with a souvenir section in one corner. The only thing they have are some fluffy Koala bear slippers. I fork over my credit card and sign the slip. "My shoes got stolen," I explain to the Chinese gentleman as he fills it out.

When I come out of the shop, Mangala bursts out laughing.

"Hey Mangala, this is definitely because I'm with you! These kinds of things do not happen to me!"

Another mad dash across town ensues, with horns blaring at us as we negotiate the one-way streets, overpasses, tunnels and other obstacles of Sydney's labyrithine streets.

Finally we arrive, against all odds. I'd already resigned myself to inevitable fate - whatever it may bring. I'm just sitting in the passenger seat of the Holden Commodore, in my fluffy Koala slippers.

I jump down from the car and grab my suitcase. Mangala is going to come up to Brisbane in a few days time, so I bid him adieu, and head into the airport.

Now, that's adventure enough, don't you think?

I'm shellshocked. Flew down from Brisbane the night before, spent the day at the beach in the hot sun at a wedding, flew around town trying to find shoes and then to get to the airport. Totally exhausted.

I get through airport security and try to make myself inconspicuous in a chair in the waiting lounge amidst the other passengers, in my Hare Krishna robes and fluffy Koala slippers.

I flip open my iBook and start reviewing a few pages from wikipedia that I have open.

It takes maybe 15 minutes. There are three of them. A manager and two grunts.

"Excuse me sir, we're from airport security, can we speak to you for a moment over here."

What's wrong with these people? Have they never seen a Hare Krishna in fluffy Koala slippers with an iBook?

I manage to talk my way out of it ("There's a perfectly reasonable explanation for this officer...") and by the time I get back to Brisbane I'm ready to sleep for a few days (but it's back to the phones tomorrow morning).

Moral of the story: Fashion is an individual choice, but don't combine Hare Krishna robes, fluffy Koala slippers, airport lounges, and wikipedia pages about the Manhattan Project. That is too much.