Days of a life imagined

Three days in. The pattern of my imagined island life begins to emerge. This much is clear. I will move more slowly through the world; the tropical heat and humidity see to that.

Home of the morning's chorister

.The days begins with the dawn chorus. I'm woken by the melodic singing of a single bird in the trees outside our bedroom on the hotel's breakfast patio. It was truly a delight to listen to that bird as it chirruped and warbled and whistled for maybe half an hour. It was as lovely and complicated and gently mesmerising as a fugue by Bach (to try to wax too lyrical for my own good).

But -- if you don't mind me becoming a wee bit Scottish Presbyterian about it at the same time -- can I say this too? Gie us a break, wull ye burdie! Dawn, and its chorus, start at ten past four in the morning in Nouméa in November.

Now, because nothing escapes the all-seeing eye of Sauron, I noticed that Spike's head was no longer resting on the pillow next to mine. Cunning man that I am (with a mind like a steel trap) further investigations revealed it was Spike's feet which were now 'Dougie-adjacent' to my left ear. Overnight, my darling had reversed her polar alignment to place her head directly beneath the ceiling fan (whirring away at full bore) in the centre of the room.

It's that sort of hot and humid. Even at half past four in the morning.

So, not much later, we gave up all pretence at sleeping. We dressed then headed out to le marché municipal at the harbour. Searching for le petit déjeuner français de Nouméa.

We found it.

Dougie -- looking rested, refreshed and at his sartorial best -- is ready to eat.

Who wouldn't fancy chocolat chaud (Dougie) an enormous bowl of café au lait (Spike) and French baked goods (both of us)? At half past eight in the morning. At 28 degrees. And 83% humidity. But ... when in Nouméa, do as the Nouméans. So, we did.

We bought fresh fruit.

Fresh fruit n veg in crates at the market

We didn't by fish or fruits de mer.

Fresh fish and other creatures of the sea

And I thought to myself ... Dougie, we don't have this view from our ALDI.

Where shall I park our catamaran?

At one point of one day (can't recall which) I was mildly hopeful -- because I am a glass half-full sort of bloke -- we might get to move around the city (if not the whole island -- which would have been glass-very-definitely-full-to-the-top Dougie) by bus. It was the bus service information office of Tanéo (the Nouméa bus people) at the city centre interchange that got my hopes up. There were two ramps up to the building, an automatic door and -- Dougie-adjacent-enough -- a wheelchair accessible public lavatory.

Nice infrastructure ... shame about the services.

So, I pushed me and my Duolingo French into the small office (with a cooling fan large enough and loud enough to power a Boeing 747) to request information about les transports en commun accessibles aux personnes handicapées. I waited in the queue, checking and double-checking my question in French. The lady in front of me took a long time to pay for her bus pass so my question was very well-rehearsed.

When my turn came, the Tanéo lady behind the screen listened carefully to my perfectly rendered French (albeit with a Scottish lilt). She consulted (at length) with her colleague at the next screen. There was what I considered to be a full and detailed conversation. Then she turned back to me and spoke through her microphone / speaker with the power and volume of Zeus on Mount Olympus to answer my question.

PAS DE TOUT!

Switch off the mic.

You don't need my 402-day streak of Duolingo French to get that message. "None at all". Over the last forty years I've heard the same response in all kinds of languages on 5 of the world's 7 continents (and Antarctica doesn't really count because there are no buses to the South Pole). It's just a bit sad to still be hearing this message of exclusion in the 21st Century.

So, we left. And we've wandered and wandered and wandered like tourists. Which is what we are. It's only in my imagined New Caledonian life that I'm an access and inclusion consultant living in a wheelchair accessible catamaran on the harbour of Nouméa.

We wandered along the road round the promontory on the south of the harbour. Literally along the road which freaks out a lot of my friends at times (as they amble along Dougie-adjacent-pavements which sometimes have potholes and loose pavers or no dropped kerb at their end). So, it suits me to follow the most accessible routes -- aka roads -- in small, quiet places where everyone can see me coming from a long way off.

A road to nowhere. But better access route than broken pavements.

Sometimes -- because it's hot and humid on a Pacific Ocean tropical island -- and because the Johann Sebastian Bach of birds woke me at ten past four -- I forget which side of the road folk drive on in Not-Australia. I think that adds to my charm. Spike disagrees.

Inaccessible front entrance to City Museum

At one stage we wandered to Musée de la Ville with its five French steps at its very pretty front door. Spike climbed the five steps, entered the charming French colonial building then asked if there was access to the museum for visitors who use wheelchairs.

Non!

This came as both a disappointment and a surprise. Because, when we continued our wandering, we discovered later that behind the locked gates of the staff entrance and car park there is a distinctly not-French-colonial wheelchair ramp along the side of the building leading to the pretty front door except the route is blocked by a nice park bench behind / in front of a rope barrier fixed to the wall with a "fuck off wheelchair users" no entry sign.

Barriers to access & inclusion arise from a state of mind and bad attitudes.

I understand that message in every language known to humanity. And some that aren't. I'll deal with it later.

So, we crossed the road and sat in the park to cool off because afternoons in Nouméa are even hotter and more humid than ten past four in the morning. It was there I sat transfixed, watching a man climbing to the top of a tall, tall public garden palm tree with the aid of two bits of rope and spiked crampon attachments on his boots.

His job? Palm tree pruner.

How to prune a palm tree -- lesson 1

Never in my wildest imaginings as a boy growing up in Glasgow did I ever conceive of such a job. Here, in my imagined new life in New Caledonia -- I thought -- if I can't be an access and inclusion consultant living in a wheelchair accessible catamaran, maybe I could become an apprentice palm tree pruner?