1968-69: Gross!

Gross! Snakes on Daddy

Gross! Camel Breath 

     
     Beyond the cool of the adventure, "gross" was ever-present.  Traveling as we did in second class there were plenty of stinky buses, filthy hotels and scary ferries. When the teenage-girl commentary on the trip became a whinery of complaints, i.e. “gross, stupid, ugly, gnarly, weird, grody-to-the-max,” Daddy decided that he’d let us make the decisions, live with the consequences. Just a few months into the year, he divvied the family into three travel agent teams: Daddy & Sarah, Mommy & me and Dede & Betsy. Each pair would be responsible for a two week stint, making all choices: where, when, how, why and the resulting travel and hotels were their burden or pride to deal with.


Djakarta, Indonesia:


      From my mother’s diary: December 12th, 1968 “Djakarta from air: dark orange tile roofs, green palms, red earth. Nonnie and I, as travel agents, got a dump. The Transaerea Hotel: no toilet seat, tile basin with bucket for shower, hard bed, peeling walls, no ‘egg-nishner’ (AC) -- Grimsville.”

      My diary was less kind: “Disgusting, rats run amok, bugs constant, toilet hole in floor, can’t sleep. Pan-American, tower of elegance, nearby but TT (tourist trap) and expensive. Nasi Goreng good.  First morning train -2nd class- to Bandung.”

      Daddy’s idea was brilliant. I had made the call to put us in the gross hotel, so my only complaints –except between sisters in the dark with the spiders- were quietly entered into my Dear Diary.  I was quickly learning to take and hold responsibility for my actions, and stand up for my decisions.  Like it or not.



Gross!  Wadi Halfa Hilton

 Train across the Sahara – Khartoum to Wadi Halfa

      From my diary: March 8th, 1969 “The train is waiting, the time is 6:45 am, the place is Khartoum, Sudan and the Coopers are there” for an open-air, over-night cross-Sahara train trip. “The train is hot and uncomfortable but interesting. The desert stretches as far as you can see. Mirages appear and disappear. We rode along the Nile for awhile.


      The people are friendly. The sleeping was really bad, with smoke and dust coming in the windows all the time. There is a common water jug in each car, Mommy, Sarah and I dip our washcloths in there and put them on our heads.  Later, we drink from it because it's all there is!  Gross!”