Travels in a Wheelchair in Jamaica
I like Americans. I have not met very many but all of those I have met, I like very much. For some reason best known to them, they tend not to visit Lowestoft, Barnet or Winchmore Hill, the three places where I have spent most of my life. “That’s their loss,” is all I can say to that and I can’t really understand why those towns have been so neglected by visitors from overseas.
It wasn’t always the case. Lowestoft is the most easterly point of the British Isles and it was very popular with western European tourists in the forties when it became the most heavily bombed settlement per head of population in Britain.
Barnet has given its name to the English language, as in, “Blimey! What the hell have you done with your Barnet?” (Americans reading this: Barnet Fair – hair. Rhyming slang) and Winchmore Hill is just a jolly nice place.
Americans, I like. America, I don’t. On September 28th 2008, I arrived in Fort Lauderdale, Florida for the liver transplant procedure. I didn’t need a visa to gain entry as we have a visa arrangement with the US whereby UK citizens may visit the States for 90 days without needing a visa. It is not as good a deal as it seems, however, because it’s a reciprocal arrangement and so it means that the UK has to let in Donald Trump, George Bush and Mel Gibson with no questions asked.
I think the scheme was instigated by America as a way of apologising for Dick van Dyke’s cockney accent in Mary Poppins and for all the movies in which Errol Flynn and John Wayne win the Second World War on their own with no assistance from the British forces whatsoever.
I was told that I would be in hospital for approximately six weeks. In December it became obvious that I was going to remain in hospital care for more than 90 days. Caroline did all she could, including visiting the Department for Homeland Security offices in Miami to seek an extension.
She was told that she could not act on my behalf and I would have to appear in person. She explained to them that as I was in a hospital bed with several tubes running in and out of me and that as I was on oxygen too, it would be a little tricky. But in America, rules are rules.
We had to go to the US in January this year. On arriving at Miami airport, I was taken into a side room and left there with about sixty dodgy looking characters, all of whom were probably only intent on working very hard for very low pay, for the betterment of the US and incidentally, for themselves.
At 10:20 pm, after a four-hour wait, I was interviewed. A very nice man informed me that entry into the United States was a privilege and I had abused that privilege. He ignored my protestations and the letter that I showed him from my surgeon. He informed me that I would be allowed entry but only for three days and that I would need a visa in future. He stamped, “ON PAROLE” in my passport.
When we returned to Cayman I knew that I had to get a visa as soon as possible. I need entry to the States regularly and sometimes with very short notice because of my medical needs. There is no Embassy in Cayman and so Caroline and I had to travel to Kingston, Jamaica to visit the American Embassy there. We had a 7:00 am interview.
We had heard dreadful accounts about the procedure for acquiring a visa, including stories of several hours spent standing in line. “You’ll need a wheelchair,” said Caroline. “You won’t be able to stand for all that time.” She was right. I wouldn’t have been able to.
Up until about eight months ago, when I was a genuine invalid using a wheelchair every day, air travel was a completely different experience: I was directed to the front of every queue, both when departing and arriving. I don’t know what the hundreds of people in the lines were thinking as we sailed past them because I kept my head down and never looked them in the eye.
I had my own chair but four months ago I donated it, my walking frame and several other aids to the Red Cross.
Our flight left in the early evening and on our way to the airport we stopped off at the hospital to ‘borrow’ a wheelchair. There is an area just inside the main doors where five or six are usually parked but that time there were none. Caroline and I agreed to split up, search the various departments and meet back in the foyer. I went to the dialysis unit, the physiotherapy area and other departments but found none. My cell phone rang. It was Caroline telling me that she had been successful. We met up and practised for our rôle -play to come.
“Look ill!” she said as she dropped me off at Airport Departures before parking the car. “No, iller than that and try and look really weak too.”
I played my part magnificently. We were the first to board the plane and we had the best seats with extra legroom. At Kingston International, we were rushed through and were sitting to eat in the hotel restaurant only an hour after touch down.
There are drawbacks to being in a wheelchair in Kingston and even greater problems when pushing one. The kerbs are at least seven inches high and there are very few ramps. The pavements are so uneven and rough in places that the only wheeled vehicle that can negotiate them safely is a Range Rover. Kingston, unlike George Town where Caroline perfected her pushing skills, also has hills.
The next day, approaching the Embassy, Caroline was struggling. I was uncomfortable but as I had to keep in rôle, I couldn’t do much to help. Even though it was 6:45 in the morning, the temperature had already reached 84°F. On one particularly rough uphill section, only 20 yards from the Embassy gates and with sweat pouring down her face, she finally snapped.
“Get out and fucking walk,” she screamed at me.
Fortunately, the noise of the rush hour traffic meant that only I heard her.
“I can’t. I’ve got to stay in rôle,” I explained patiently, smiling sweetly and nodding towards an Embassy guard only a few yards away. Maybe I was sniggering just a little and that got her really angry.
“It’s not easy for me either, you know,” I said.“ And you are supposed to be playing the part of the devoted, selfless Carer.”
The guard saw our difficulty and came over to help. I do like Americans. Caroline left me to check our forms with the officials at the entrance and the guard spoke to me.
“Is she your full-time helper?” he asked.
“No, she’s my wife.”
“Does she push you around all the time?”
“Yes, all the time. How can you tell?”
Caroline found that we were missing a vital piece of paper work. We needed a receipt from the National Bank showing that we had already paid for the visa. The bank did not open until 8:30 and so, to pass the time, Caroline pushed me to a Wendy’s where we had a coffee.
An hour later while waiting outside the bank for it to open we became acquainted with a young Australian hairdresser from Cayman who I had noticed on the plane the night before. She was blond, wore 6-inch stilettos and had the shortest skirt I have seen since 1968. She did have fantastic legs though, so why not?
“I feel awkward here. I feel so conspicuous,” she said. “Everyone keeps staring at me.”
“Really?” I said. “I wonder why?
“I think it’s because I’m white,” she replied.
“Yes, that’ll be it,” said Caroline.
The stories that we had heard about the Embassy were true and worse. We queued for hours. At last we were done and eventually, we were ready to go. Our flight was not until much later in the evening and so we went up into the Blue Mountains, which are really beautiful and toured a coffee farm and the adjoining coffee factory. Fortunately, I had a miraculous recovery and did not have the need for the wheelchair.
The flight back that evening was uneventful. Again, we zoomed past the crowds and by 10 pm we were back in Cayman. I decided to drop off the wheelchair at the hospital on the way home. There was nobody around as I pushed the wheelchair through the foyer to leave it.
I was walking back towards the car when a voice called out.
“Excuse me sir. Don’t leave it there. Will you take it back to the department please? We are trying to tidy this area up.”
“I don’t know where it came from,” I said.
“It will be written on the back,” he said.
For the first time I looked at the back of the chair - the part that hundreds of people in Cayman, Jamaica, the American Embassy and Caroline had all seen very clearly. In large red letters on a white background was printed:
RETURN TO OBSTETRICS
AND GYNAECOLOGY
I don’t know where and I don’t know when. I don’t know how yet but of course, neither does she. All we both know is that some day, O Happy Day, I will get revenge.
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