As I am running for my connection in Stockholm Arlanda desperate for the loo, I fleetingly cast my mind back to the 4 am start and the relative cheer I had felt as I ate the last of my Christmas Day roast beef in a sandwich coasting down the M1 and looking forward to my week away. Now, having stressed as our flight in Heathrow was delayed, and in Stockholm being corralled by some clipboard-toting-Swedish-female-Commandant who has held the flight to Oulu especially for us, I am judging how long I can restrain myself from veering off into the most available toilets (ladies, men’s toilets, at this stage I would not be fussy) when I find myself on one side of a revolving door with my fellow Exodus companions stranded on the other side. As I stand, legs crossed ( literally) jigging about in a temperature of minus nine desperate not to embarrass myself, the Commandant spends ten minutes with her swipe card, trying to work out what the problem is. Me, I am stand with my nose against the floor to ceiling glass panel adjacent to the non-complying revolving door staring fixedly at the sign for the toilets just beyond it. I wonder for a moment if I have to pee, whether it will just freeze in my knickers. Having arrived at last upon the aeroplane - a very intimate affair of only sixty seats - and to the clear disgruntlement of passengers already upon it I settle in, legs crossed ever more tightly, praying for takeoff. Normally I hate this part and over the years I have created a ‘take-off mantra’ which I habitually mutter to myself as the heap of metal hurls itself down the runway gaining sufficient velocity to take off, but today, I am desperate for it to get going. The captain took us through his flight checks, got us ready for take-off, I had my mantra at the ready and then…. all the lights went out. I was sitting on a plane that was ready for take-off and which, all of a sudden had been plummeted (probably poor use of verb) into darkness. I clutched my crucifix more tightly, glad we were not off the ground and marvelled at the strength of the female pelvic platform.
More on Finland, tomorrow.
See the pictures on the gallery.