Taking a wizz at Liverpool Street Station
May 2010 |
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Hang on a minute though. When a flight from Stansted to Spain costs less than a bag of chips, why are people so upset about being charged a few quid more for additional extras? I guarantee it’s still going to end up being considerably cheaper than travelling with someone like British Airways. Even if that weren't the case, there is no guarantee that the British Airways pilot would be sober... or not be on strike.
Also, their idea about charging to use the toilet is only going to be for flights that last under an hour. Firstly, that means the charge is only going to apply to domestic flights within the United Kingdom and anyway, I’m sorry, but anyone over the age of 6 should be sensible enough to go to the loo before they board a flight and should have a strong enough bladder to be able to hold it in for an hour if they've had one too many tipples on the plane.
The only people this is going to affect are young children and pensioners, both of whom have bladders the size of peas. Without running the risk of sounding ageist, I think this can only be a good thing as it may encourage these people to seek alternative means of transport. I say this is a good thing because I get fed up with almost every flight I’m on being delayed because some senile old couple have got lost or haven’t heard the final boarding call and then, once up in the air, finding out I’m sharing the plane with annoying little brats who scream the place down and spend the entire flight kicking the back of my chair while their parents pretend not to notice.
It’s not uncommon to have to pay for public conveniences either. In fact in the rest of Europe it’s almost expected. I’ve probably driven through France and Belgium more times than I've visited our capital city and I can tell you most toilets at service stations are guarded by a blind Frenchman in a wheelchair who expects you to put a few Euro cents in his bucket. Not to do so is deemed very bad manners indeed.
The phrase “spend a penny” derives from the days when women used to have to pay a penny to use the sit-down service in public lavatories. There are still some public bogs that do charge. Apparently George Michael often spends his load in public toilets.
So anyway, I’m going to Germany for a day at the end of this year. Yes that’s right, a day! The cost of a Ryan Air flight to and from Baden-Baden is less than the cost of a rail ticket to London and back. Now let me just put this into perspective: From my house to London Liverpool Street is less than 50 miles. Baden-Baden is 550 miles away in Germany, which involves flying over the channel and over central France. Given how much Kerosene an aircraft guzzles every second compared to the relatively efficient electrical wattage used to power the modern day passenger train, it is a fair assumption that the material cost of air travel is considerably greater than the cost of rail travel. When a train that is capable of carrying significantly more people than an aeroplane is charging more per person for a journey 6 times shorter, that gets me thinking that perhaps the rail companies are ripping us off even more than we realise.
This startling revelation brings me splashing round the U-bend and on to a very relevant price related toilet topic.
I went to London for a night out a few weeks ago which was expensive in itself because London is one of the most over-priced, over-rated, nasty dirt holes in the known universe. Consequently, by the end of the night the City had not only sucked out my will to live but had also left me with absolutely no money whatsoever.
As you can probably imagine, having spent an evening abusing my liver by drinking several pints of lager, by the time I’d got from the West End of London back to Liverpool Street I was somewhat in need of a visit to the little boys room.
Now, having spent the equivalent of a small national debt on a rail ticket, I would expect them to throw in the use of their station toilets for free. So you can imagine my utter horror when, on the verge of having an extremely embarrassing accident, I was blocked by a scary looking illegal immigrant who was demanding I cross his palm with silver in exchange for full use of the facilities.
Desperately trying to explain to this guy I had no money left was futile because he couldn’t speak a word of English. My attempt at sign language was also useless because I had to hold my tackle to avoid any chance of leakage.
This left me with three realistic options: I could stand there and wet myself in front of everybody; I could punch the guy to the floor, jump the turnstile and do my business; or I could leg it out of the station and find a secluded corner somewhere.
Deciding that discretion would be the better part of valour, I decided on option 3. Unfortunately there aren’t many places that are adequately discreet at Liverpool Street Station and, after spending 10 minutes running around with a wild eyed expression, cupping my crotch and succeeding only in looking like a crazed pervert, I eventually came to the awful realisation that I might actually have to wet my pants.
It's said that people have epiphanies on the toilet. Certainly I've had some of my best business ideas while squatting on the Jon. And it was at this moment of sheer eye-watering panic that I suddenly realised in my drunken state that trains had toilets on them and there were several of them waiting for their departure time to arrive. Looking on each platform, squinting at the insanely small writing on the screens, I aimed for a train that wasn't due to leave for another 10 minutes. Genius! This would leave me with more than enough time to do what I needed to do, get off the train and wait in comfort for my train to arrive.
Running as fast as is humanly possible with a bladder that’s on the verge of exploding, I made it on the train and then had to run through every carriage until I found one with a loo on it.
The sight of that dirty, smelly, germ infested bowl was almost overwhelming. I would like to take this opportunity to apologise to the rest of the carriage for the weird noises of pleasure emitting from the cubicle and for the no doubt suspicious image of a man emerging from a public lavatory with a huge grin on his face. I would also like to point out to those who feel the need to complain about Ryan Air charging a pound to use the toilets on a flight that cost about the same amount, that perhaps they should focus their anger on Network Rail who charge an extortionate amount to use their trains and still charge for use of station toilets.
