EU-CONNECT 2000 BRIGHTON GROUP

Character's name: I.M Grate
A middle-aged English Gentleman who has worked abroad for a long time.
Stranger on the tube
(this story first appeared in the Love train collection of stories)
The train entered the station like a rocket. The station was more crowded than usual.
In addition to the usual commuters, there were the football fans going to the stadium
to support their team. Fatima and Zahra with difficulty made their way to a place near
one of the train doors. By the time they managed to get into the train all the seats
were taken so they tried to find a corner in the back of the compartment to use the
wall as support to avoid falling down. But as more and more people got into the train
they found it difficult to stay in their quiet corner and gradually got pushed to the
centre isle in between the seats. Once the doors got closed and the train started
pulling out of the station it was difficult to keep your balance so Fatima decided
to hang on to Zahra who was slightly taller and could reach the strap on the ceiling.

Although the two sisters had been in London for two months they were still not used
to travelling on the underground. On the whole they found this wet, damp and crowded
city very unfriendly and hostile. Their parents had sent them to England to learn
English and acquire secretarial skills. But the girls weren't quite sure if they wanted
to speak a foreign language or learn typing and shorthand. On the whole they felt
very bored but being of a very lively disposition, they always tried to find something
amusing to laugh about.

As the train got out of the city centre and started making its journey to the suburbs,
the number of passengers gradually diminished, and eventually Fatima and Zahra found
two empty seats. Just as they made themselves comfortable, they noticed a gentleman
sitting opposite them. He looked really weird in his bowler hat and pinstriped suit
holding his tightly rolled umbrella, which was really odd as it was a relatively
sunny and dry day. To begin with the girls tried as hard as they could to hide their
giggles and smiles from the city gentleman, but after a while with boredom and all
that they just couldn't help it. It was Fatima who really started it. She thought
that insofar as she didn't look directly towards the man, he wouldn't suspect that
she was talking about him in her native tongue to her sister.
"Oh look at his hat, doesn't it look funny!" Fatima said to Zahra.
"And his umbrella, do you think he knows something we don't know?".
And so the conversation went on and the girls gradually became livelier and bolder
in their remarks, making fun of him and being sure he couldn't understand a word.
As the man was reading his Times very intently and didn't seem to have noticed the
girls at all, the girls didn't seem to have any cause to worry about being overheard,
let alone understood.

When the train pulled into Wimbledon Common station the man got
up and turned to the girls speaking perfectly in their native tongue:
"Thanks for your generous compliments ladies! I hope to meet you sometime in the future
to tell you about what I thought of people in your country!"

Second episode .

<< He got off the train and rushed to his solicitor's office in Wimbledon High Street.
He was rather pre-occupied as he had received a very strange letter from Ireland and had
no idea what to do with it. On his arrival at the solicitor's office the clerk informed him that
unfortunately there was no one available to see him on that day and could he return
the next day. It was of course impossible for him to do so as he had arranged to be
in Brighton the next day. So he left the office and decided to have a stroll in Wimbledon
Common. The mysterious letter he had received that morning was about some Irish painter
whose work had recently been discovered, but why on earth should he be informed.
He suddenly remembered that years ago he knew someone called Volker and this letter
somehow had reminded him of Volker. Maybe he
should get in touch with him about this mystery. After his visit to Brighton he had
to go to Brussels on business, so he could arrange to take a little trip to Bonn where Volker lived.

The trip to Brighton went as planned and it was on the train on his way back that it
all began to make sense.

Third episode
From Brighton to Waterloo
The train to London was very crowded as usual. Walking aimlessly from one end of the train to
the other he tried to find an empty seat but all the seats were taken. He was beginning to resign
himself to 59 minutes of standing when he noticed a seat being taken by a guitar in a green case. He thought:

"Well surely on a busy train like this a guitar shouldn't take a seat to itself."

He had a look around to see if it belonged to someone else. There were a couple of young
people sitting next to the guitar engaged in a very private conversation. He asked them if it
belonged to them, they looked a bit annoyed at being interrupted and denied any knowledge
about the owner. Next to them a tallish blond man was sitting busy reading an article in a
medical journal. He thought surely he wouldn't be selfish enough to leave his guitar on a seat
like that. While he was picking some courage to ask him if the guitar belonged to him, he noticed
a very old man sitting on the other seat next opposite seat to the guitar. He specifically noticed
his hand which was holding an envelope very similar to the one in which he had received the
mysterious letter from Western Light Art Gallery.

This was really strange. No sooner had he seen this envelope than he notice a large tag dangling
from the side of the guitar. It had an address in Brussels on it and also attached to the tag was a
very similar envelope to mysterious letter. He thought: "Well well well! We all seem to be in the
same boat or rather in the same train." The night before he had finally managed to get in touch
with his friend Volker who lived in Bonn apparently he also had received a letter from the art
gallery in Achill. As he had some business to attend to in Brussels they had organised to meet there and talk about it.

Something made him bring the letter out of his pocket and no sooner had he done so than the
couple, the blond man and the old man all looked up and stared at him. By this time they had
arrived at Victoria and he had to rush out to get his connection to Waterloo.

Episode 4 Waterloo to Brussels

In Waterloo station Ian managed to get to the train just in time. When he got settled down in his seat he decided to have another look at the letter from the searcher. Years ago he had attended a lecture given by Brian O'Donnell in Fulda. He couldn't remember when it was. "Was it in 1989 or was it in 1990? Anyway never mind!" He thought. It was when he was writing to Volker that he had remembered this lecture in Fulda. That's why he had managed to find his old address book and looked up the address of the so called "searcher" He had written to him and a very vague answer had come back that he would be in Brussels and they could meet there. This arrangement suited him well as he had also arranged to meet Volker in Brussels. He looked in his jacket pocket where he was sure he had hurriedly put the letter on his way out of his flat but he couldn't find it in his jacket pockets. He looked in his coat pockets but the letter was not there either. He hadn't had time to write the name of the café where they were to meet in his address book. He thought the letter might have fallen out when he was taking his ticket out at Victoria station. "Well at least he had Volker's mobile number with him and he could ask Volker." He thought. After the train started the tea lady came but there seemed to be something wrong with one of the wheels of her trolley. She had great difficulty in pushing the trolley in between the seats. When the tea lady finally got to him he bought a coup of coffee and some cake. Before he had managed to take a sip, there was a sudden jerk and some of the coffee spilled on his trousers. The blonde chap sitting opposite him immediately came to his rescue offering him a serviette. While he was thanking the blond man he suddenly noticed the A young looking chap sitting across the isle bent over and straightened the guitar which had fallen forward as a result of the jerk. When the ticket collector came to check the tickets they noticed that he also punched the guitar label. Ian thought: "How strange to treat a guitar like a passenger!" It must have been the puzzled look on his face that made the ticket collector say, a customer had specifically bought the seat for the guitar and they are coming to collect it in Brussels. At this point Ian noticed that the young couple sitting on the other side of the isle and the old man who was talking to them stopped their conversation with a look of surprise on their faces. The blond man said to the young man: " I thought this guitar was yours." The young man replied:" No but judging by the label it is going to Achill where we are heading to." "Achill!" Shouted the old man. "I'm going there too!" Ian had to confess that his destination was also Achill. The blond man smiled and said: "It is a small world, guest where I'm going to" and they all said: "Not Achill" "Yes!" replied the blond man.

Episode 5 from Brussels to Dublin

Ian finally found his seat on the plane. It was a really crowded flight with a lot of odd people around. Unfortunately the people he had met on the train to Brussels hadn't been allocated seats anywhere near him, so he felt a bit lonely. He still couldn't believe how the old man in Eurostar had suddenly held out his hand holding the letter from the searcher and saying did you drop this at Victoria station. It was such a lucky coincidence. He was so glad that he almost wanted to give the old man a hug. But instead he offered to buy him a drink in the Grand Place in Brussels. Later on in the cafe he discovered that the old man had also received a letter about the Brian O'Donnell affair, a fact which explained why he was also heading for Achill. He was really disappointed not to have seen either "the searcher" or Volker in Brussels. Neither of them turned up at the appointed place and he was quite worried about them. He didn't realise that he had dosed off until he became aware of a lot of commotion and noise around him. The food trolleys were being pushed around. "Oh goody food time." He thought. He began eating his salad and cheese, and stirred his coffee, but as soon as he took a sip he couldn't help spitting it all over his tray. The coffee really tasted awful. The old man next to him looked quite angry at his messy behaviour and tried to look elsewhere. He tried to apologise as best as he could, saying that the coffee tasted salty. The old man said: "Well, a good job I don't take sugar with my coffee." Soon it turned out that most of the passengers had put sugar in their tea and coffee. After a short apology from an airhostess with an explanation that the salt and sugar packs must have got mixed up in the factory the passengers calmed down and the rest of the journey passed without any more adventures at least for Ian. Episode 6 Dublin to Westport Ian wasn't in a good mood at all. The night before he hadn't slept well as the hotel in Dublin was really noisy, his bed was very soft and the springs in the mattress creaked very badly. He had managed to go round Dublin a little bit, but he found the Temple Bar area where his hotel was situated very crowded and lively. The whole place swarmed with young people who were having a good time and he had spent too much time in pubs drinking Guinness. He remembered it was in one of the pubs that he was given a strange coin among the change. It looked weird, it had the picture of a castle on one side and something written on the other side, was it "once upon a time"? Any way he showed it to an Irish chap who happened to be sitting next to him. He remembered no sooner had he shown it than the Irish chap started laughing loudly and attracting everybody's attention to them. Then when the others realised what had happened they all started laughing and soon the whole place was roaring with everybody's laughter. There seemed to be a joke and the only person who hadn't got it was poor Ian. He felt so embarrassed that he left his drink unfinished and rushed out of the pub. Later on in another pub another Irish man had explained the joke to him which at the time seemed very funny but as he was very drunk he couldn't remember a word of it. How he had got to his hotel and found his bed was still a mystery to him. He had no recollection of what had happened to him at all. He thought he was suffering from a sever hangover. He decided to take a stroll to the restaurant car and have a coffee. He found a vacant seat by a window and squeezed himself into it. After a little while the waiter came to take his order, and Ian couldn't believe his eyes when he saw who the waiter was. "Blow me down if it is not our very own Volker." He shouted. First Volker hadn't recognised Ian and was very puzzled that Ian knew his name. But after a few minutes he remembered Ian. As he was really busy they decided to meet in Volker's time off to talk about the good old days. When Ian got back to his seat he saw that his hand luggage looked a mess and his sandwich bag was all torn up and the best part of the sandwich was gone. He looked under the seat and found a bit of tomato. It looked suspiciously like the bit of tomato in his sandwich. He had a good look in his hand luggage and discovered that fortunately nothing else was missing. He didn't mind about the sandwich, he wasn't really very hungry anyway. Later on he saw a man (link to the dog owner) approaching him and apologising for the bad behaviour of his dog. Apparently the dog had stolen many other passengers' food. A few minutes before getting to Westport station he saw Volker approaching his seat. He was very glad that at last he could catch up with his old acquaintance, but when Volker got to him he extended his hand and said: "Brian O'Donnell. Glad to meet you." " What on earth do you mean Volker?" Ian shouted. But before Volker had a chance to say anything he fell down flat on his face and unconscious. Ian took him to an empty seat and a few other passengers rushed to him. Fortunately there was a nurse among them who managed to revive Voker. He seemed very week, so Ian didn't mention the incident. They just talked about the good old days in Bonn. But Ian guessed that Volker must have some sort of personality disorder, which makes him believe he is someone else.

Episode 6 In Achill

Ian had managed to change his well tailored suit for a designer pair of jeans, a ribbed chenille sweater, a tweed cap and a Gore-Tex jacket to protect him from rain. He had already arranged to pick up a car from the Hertz agent at Westport and as the only car they had for hire was an eight-seater minibus he decided to offer a lift to some of the people he had met on the train. (links to the guy with the pony tail, the searcher, and Volker) He knew they were all going to the auction in a village called Keel. The road to Mulrany was quite busy, but then as they headed westward the traffic got lighter. At Achill Sound they passed the old battered station building and Ian remembered he had read something about it in a guide book. Apparently the first train into the station had carried the dead bodies of some of the islanders who had drowned when a ferry had toppled over. When later on in the nineteen thirties the railway had stopped running the last train into Achill Sound had also brought the dead bodies of some of the islanders, this time the victims of a fire in Scotland. As they drove towards Keel village where the auction took place they couldn't help admiring the wild beauty of the island. There was particularly a very majestic mountain which later on Ian discovered was called Slieve More. At Keel they decided to share a holiday cottage together and afterwards they went to one of the local pubs. (link to local characters in Keel) In the pub Ian met the old man (link to the old man) from Brighton, and the young Dr(link to Nadia's character) from Greece. An old lady called Auntie Charlotte (link to auntie Charlotte) was holding a guitar( link to Sonja's character) and strumming it very gently. The young couple who were in love had completely disappeared from the scene. Ian was really looking forward to the auction the next day, as he hoped to see some of the paintings he had seen ages ago when he went to Brian O'Donnel's lecture. Well he would have to wait and see what was in store for him.