First Impressions

2

First Impressions

    At least the fucking remote’s actually working! Not that I’m not capable of heaving the bloody garage door up, but bloody Hell, if a bloke pays a bloke to put in a fucking electronic system he expects it to ruddy well work! Likewise the sodding air conditioning, and by Christ if that’s not working I’ll have the bloody firm’s guts for garters—in fact I’ll blacklist the buggers forever and a day! ...All right, it is. So I should hope. ...Knew she wouldn’t be here. Well, I did say I hadda go out this evening, but heck, she could’ve come round for a bit! Well, for a bit of the other, to be strictly accurate, but—yeah. All right, I will have a whisky, ’cos you can bet yer boots anything that’s served up tonight won’t be drinkable! With ice, yeah: the air-con’s doing its best but it’s been stinking humid all day.

    ... Aah! That’s better! Wish I’d asked Bob to drive me tonight, actually, then I could get pissed—well, ’tis nominally a business meeting but are they prepared to do business, that’s the thing! Well, that Pommy joker has ostensibly come out all the way from Pongo ’cos he wants a joint venture with the Group, but if you ask me, he’s come out because he wants a nice break away from the flaming English winter! Mind you, if ’e stays on for Christmas in these here parts he’ll wish he hadn’t, ’cos while his hotel will be nominally open—well, its front door won’t be locked—everything else’ll be shut. Dead as a doornail. There’ll be nothing to do except eat the hotel’s idea of Christmas dinner, the mind boggles, and get kaylied. …No, couldn’t really ask poor ole Bob to drive me, the man’s older than I am. Bugger.

    ... I could give her a bell, she is only just up the hill, bloody good thing those chalets of mine were going begging, eh? Well, going begging because that nasty little worm Don Banks has got his Council mates to put the kybosh on my road going through. And why it can’t be a private driveway— No, see, the Council regs won’t let ya do that, Carrano. Why not? ’Cos flaming Don Banks says so, apparently! No, all right, Simpkins got the boys in Legal to look up the bloody by-laws and it was there in black and white, but by-laws can be changed, can’t they? Only takes one vote. One vote of all those tits that Banks has got on his side because he owns the fucking Puriri Arcade and half the real estate on the Puriri waterfront! Must say it was a bit of a surprise to realise he owns Wenderholm, that motel’s been there forever, used to be pale green stucco back when, but it looks good in that new pale apricot, kind of suits them art deco lines. No, all right, Carrano, ya don’t wanna own the dearest motel in Puriri, ’tisn’t ya core business... Well, worked out good, because I could let one of the chalets to Polly—mind you, she’s paying rent. No, Jake, she couldn’t possibly live there without paying rent! Oh, well. She is a decent girl, yeah, s’pose only a tart would’ve jumped at the chance to live rent-free at J. Carrano’s expense, so see, it only felt like a kick in the guts. Wasn’t meant to be.

    ... Don’t the flaming tits on the Puriri County Council realise I could buy and sell ten ruddy Don Bankses—no, ten dozen!—and never notice it? Nope, ’cos see, they only see the EnZed business pages, if any, and the Financial Times is a closed book to them and the FTSE means less than nothing, probably say it was something to do with soccer if you asked them, and in short they’ve got their heads in the sand. ...That’s a very nice little site out past the golf course—be premature to develop it at this stage, mind you, but it’s an ageing population and they’re already heading this way in streams—and the baby-boomers’ll be coming up for retirement before long, and where are they gonna retire to? Yep, a nice little pozzie what J. Carrano will’ve bought up yonks before anyone else spotted it, that’s where! ...Townhouses for trendy young couples, too, they’ll be the next thing, never mind all them dark brick units that are going up down Pakuranga, the lefties are already starting to moan about urban sprawl. Yeah: medium density townhouses, right next to the golf course!

    On the other hand, Puriri County’s a piffling little backwater: Inoue was right, bugger him for the know-it-all, poker-face Jap he is: did ought to be concentrating on the larger scheme of things. But heck, I was born in these here parts, I don’t wanna shake the dust for good! No, well, piffling. And if these Poms really have got some Froggy partners lined up, like what they reckon, we might do a deal. Might. If the terms are right. A nice new suburban development on the outskirts of one of the big provincial cities, eh? Full of nice little townhouses for young Froggy couples with one point seven kids that don’t mind living cheek-by-jowl because it’s all the poor buggers have ever known. Pushchairs: yeah, could feature the units all having useful downstairs cupboards what you can park your pushchair in! Do the Frogs have them folding ones? Better look into that. And maybe think about little two-car garages, if you look at the French mags all the young wives seem to work these days, and they won’t necessarily all be sharing the one car, eh?

    Uh, better have a shower, if I’ve gotta get back into town for this ruddy dinner. Or a swim? Could do. Well both, plenty of time, that Pom thinks eight-thirty’s a normal time to eat; well, for some of the downtown chop houses it is, yeah. Most of them’ll be starting their second sittings, wouldn’t be surprised if we hadda wait in the bar, ’cos personally I’ve never been to the Royal when the buggers haven’t been overbooked. Not a measure of the quality of the food, no. No, well, by the local standards it is, of course. Yeah, might have a dip in the patio pool, it’ll be warm, been sitting in the sun all day, but I don’t feel energetic—

    Hullo! Someone’s out there! Did she come over after all?

    Bloody Hell! Long pale drink of water, looks like a filleted fish—a skinny filleted fish—are those them old orange baggies of mine it’s wearing? And if that isn’t a Pommy fall-over-the-forehead-lankly hairdo, I’m a Dutchman in ’is clogs! Where—the—fucking—Hell did she dredge him up?

    “Hullo, ’ullo, ’ullo, ’ullo!”

    “There you are, Jake!” she cries. Gee, that yellow bikini’s a sight for sore eyes, sweetheart.

    Okay, he is a Pom. Calls himself Roger Browne—ugh, the handshake’s fishlike, too—but she’s calling him Rog. Yeah, well. They’ve been having a lovely swim, that’s how Polly puts it, and he does hope it isn’t an intrusion, that’s how he puts it. Well, yeah, it is, so far as he’s concerned, but I did tell her to use the pool any time and to bring over any mate she liked, so I’ve got no-one but meself to blame, eh? And no, he isn’t gay.

    Okay, new French lecturer—were they expecting one? And do I care? He’s gonna be teaching blah-blah and blah-blah—hang on, thought bloody Leo taught that? No, he only takes the Third-Years and the Masters.

    “For their sins!” she says, going into that gurgling laugh of hers. He is definitely not gay, and by the way he’s gawping at her, really smitten. Didja have to wear that yellow bikini, Polly? What about that nice modest navy-blue one-piece left over from yer last year at secondary school? –Uh, no, on second thoughts, scrub that, the thing’s not lined, shows every gorgeous line and curve of her when it’s wet, down to the tummy-button, them lady teachers must be mad. Well, it was old Violet Macdonald sent her to the flaming place, true. Well, yeah, the old girl was bloody decent to her during her teens—hadda come up to the Big Smoke to go to school: her Dad’s farm’s out in the wop-wops, ya head through the Napier-Taupo hills in the general direction of east and then it’s another fifty miles from anywhere. Would’ve had to be a boarder, see, if old Vi hadn't turned up trumps and offered to put her up.

    Mind you, she seems to have got some bloody funny ideas into the poor girl’s noddle at the same time. Funny ideas about men, mostly. Well, yeah, the old girl always was a man-hater, and while Polly certainly isn’t by nature—as witness hauling this drink of water all the way up the Hibiscus Coast for a swim in me flaming patio pool—some of what ya might call the theory, or the prejudice ’ud be a better word, seems to’ve rubbed off. Has a hard time seeing blokes as real, kind of thing. Um, do I mean real? As human, maybe.

    What on earth are they drinking? Piña coladas? Uh—no, just pineapple juice, bless ’er. He thinks it’s “very exotic”, you what? Yeah, well, just pineapple juice or not, it’s got distinctly warm sitting out here in the sun—which reminds me, has she told the tit to slather himself in sunscreen? ’Cos otherwise he’s gonna be burnt to a crisp.

    “Oy, Rog, you are using sunscreen, are you?”

    “Absolutely!” he bleats. “Polly’s given me a very stern warning about that!”

    Yeah, hah, hah, very funny. Think I’ll fill up that jug and bung a lot of ice into it, because if I sit here much longer I might just say something I won’t regret. Might as well get into a pair of togs, too, given that the alternative’s to sit here listening to him blather on about not realising that there were so many varieties of Polynesians out here—never looked at the map, right—not realising how humid it would be—no knowledge of basic geography, right again—and how the casual dress the student body seems to favour took him rather aback, just at first. Eh? Thought term was over?

    “It was Rod,” Polly explains. “He looked into the staffroom to ask me something about his thesis plan—I know Leo’s supposed to be supervising it, but he took off for France three weeks back. Before their department’s marking meeting, actually, Kevin was ropeable.”

    I’d’ve said young Rod Jablonski was as normal as you can get, never mind old Jerzy Jablonski’s as mad as a hatter, what in Christ did the tit mean? Uh—just the kid’s manly beauty? Does look like a blond Michelangelo’s David, yeah, lucky little sod. Kind of the coloured-in version, y’know? But the tit definitely said “casual dress.”

    “What in Christ was ’e wearing?”

    She gives me that smile of hers. Seraphic, that’s what it is. Seraphic. “Jeans.”

    “Uh—what’s odd about that?”

    “No, just jeans, Jake! Jeans and a little gold earring.”

    “Yuh—uh, all the kids were them these days, doesn’t mean he’s gay, Rog.”

    “Oh, rather! Absolutely! Not that, Jake! No, er, well, I don’t think you’ve quite grasped it. He was only wearing jeans, you see.”

    “And the earring, and a pair of jandals,” Polly explains, think she imagines that’s a poker face—plain as a pikestaff she’s trying not to laugh.

    “Ri-ight... Aw! Right! I see, Rog, the kids back home don’t get round like that, that it?”

    “In the English climate?” she says, shuddering. Shit, don’t do that, sweetie, they’re kind of quivering!

    “No, ya wouldn’t,” I admit, can hear me voice has gone all feeble—well, wouldn’t any red-blooded bloke’s? Young Rog is looking as if he’s gonna explode, and in this instance, I can’t say I blame him.

    “No,” he manages. Okay, he’s human to that extent. “No, well, the university is downtown.”

    It’s on the far side of Albert Park, but fair enough. Two minutes down the hill and you’re right in the middle of Queen Street. “Don’t think yer average student cares what he wears, Rog—or what he doesn’t wear, come to that. And it is bloody humid today.”

    “Humid enough for cold beer!” she squeaks, collapsing in giggles.

    “Yeah, sure; ya wanna beer, Rog?”

    “No! She doesn’t mean— No, really, Jake!”

    “It’s true!” she gasps. More giggles.

    All right, it’s something the both of them know all about, for sure, so I get up and grab the jug. “In that case I’ll get a refill of pineapple juice.”

    Polly sits up straight on her sunlounger—we needed that—and wipes her eyes with the back of her hand. “He was a bit startled when I gave him a beer straight out of the staffroom fridge.”

    I’m a bit startled to know that those buggers in her faculty actually left any beer in their ruddy fridge long enough for it to get cold! There’s a pack of Germans, for a start. Big hefty bloke—did meet him once, forget his name, but looks as if he’s straight out of a holiday snap of the Oktoberfest; and that dykey German moo, she can knock it back, seen her with me own eyes at Polly’s flat-warming party. Uh—chalet-warming? Whatever ya like to call it, she had it, they all came, and they got through the beer like nobody’s biz. Into the bargain three of them stayed on for tea—it was ostensibly a lunchtime do, because we’re so far up the Coast—and knocked back more of the stuff and hadda stay the night, which kind of put the kybosh on yours truly getting round to doing anything, didn’t it?

    “Aw! Right! That urban myth about the Poms only drinking their beer warm isn’t a myth, that whatcha mean? Coulda toleja that yonks back; remind me to tell you about the time this bloke I was thinking of doing business with over there dragged me off to a real-ale pub.”

    And I go inside, but not soon enough, ’cos behind me I can hear the tit saying in a very lowered voice: “You were right, he does know the expression ‘urban myth’.” And Polly collapsing in giggles again. Yeah, all right, whatever she told him about J. Carrano he must’ve jumped to the usual conclusion that all the varsity tits do jump to, that anybody that’s in business has gotta be a thicko. ’Course, it doesn’t take brains to make a mill’ by the time you’re thirty! Jesus!

    Getting changed and refilling the jug has given him nice time to really get going, and it’s eggy-stentialism that and structural this, not building, that’d be sensible, something to do with flaming literature, and blah, blah, blah... I’m not gonna let on that I have actually heard of eggy-stentialism before this, because what does he care? Okay, I’ll have a swim. Though she is disagreeing with him, can’t be bad. No, I’ll have a swim.

    ... Phew! That’s better! Let’s have some of that juice! And given that the tit’s on my sunlounger, I’ll just sit down on this here patio chair. Well, it’s not uncomfortable, got yellow and white striped cushions to match the sunloungers and the big umbrella—don’t look at me, the fairy decorator done at it all but the effect is quite good, surprisingly enough—but that is my sunlounger.

    “Uh—yeah, ta, Polly”—accepting her towel—“did forget to grab one, yeah.”

    “See, I told you you oughta have a cabana! White with a little yellow and white striped awning!” –Having a go, see. All the nobs have cabanas. Matching their patio dee-cor, natch.

    So the tit comes out with: “Yes, a cabaña”—note the pronunciation—“would be handy for storage. And changing, when you have guests.”

    And snogging when ya don’t. Because otherwise certain hitherto unexposed portions of the anatomy do tend to get a bit singed—depending on the posish, ya see—and then you’re up half the night, moaning: “Ow, can you put some more lotion on my bum, Jake?”

    “Eh? Aw—yeah, but there isn’t enough room for one, really, Rog. Well, I’d have to slash down the shrubbery and me gardener’d go spare, he’s only just got it looking reasonable.”

    So he says eagerly: “It does look lovely! Terribly exotic!”

    Eh? Well, ’e did just say cabaña, true. “Hibiscuses and oleanders? Common as muck.”

    “Oleanders are poisonous,” she notes with a frown.

    “We know! Shit, sorry, Pol, didn’t mean to yell. No, well, ya have mentioned the point before.”

    “I’m thinking of Daph Green’s little Harry.”

    He can barely walk, I’ve only ever seen him stagger two steps. Cute as Hell, mind you.

    “I know he’s only just started to walk, but it’ll be exponential from now on!” she beams.

    Exponential. Yeah. Sigh. Now she’s explaining that Daph’s the lady that does housework for me and he’s agreeing: “Oh, yes, your char, Jake,” and gee, she’s telling him that we don’t use that word out here and most people won’t even recognise it as a word; so he doesn’t let her finish, he has to interrupt with: “I see: cleaning lady!” Now, this is what she calls the “pat-pat, funny-little-woman syndrome,” I’ve heard her say it with me own ears, only is it sinking in that he’s doing it? Not by the look of it, no, ’cos she’s giving him that smile of hers and explaining nicely that the local euphemism—I tell ya, if she brings out one more jaw-cracking polysyllabic monstrosity I’ll just about strangle ’er!—is “lady who does housework for—” Yeah.

    Good, he has to take a leak.

    “Look, Polly, while he’s gone couldja just explain why the Hell ya brought him up here? Not that I'm objecting, bring as many wet-behind-the-ears Pommy tits as ya like, but why?”

    Seraphic smile. “He’s lonely, Jake. And it’s been such a humid day, I thought a swim’d be nice. And he was wearing this revolting cream safari suit—”

    “Eh?

    “Mm. Smothered in pockets.”

    “Uh—aw! Yeah, I geddit. Pleated pockets, the Colonies for the use of, eh?”

    “Yes, that’s right! He looked terribly hot.”

    I was gonna say, didn’t he take the jacket off, but on second thoughts I won’t bother. Right, she’s going on: “So I made him take the coat off, and took him over to the staffroom for a cold beer.”

    “Yuh—uh, hang on: thought you were in the staffroom?”

    “What? No, I met him in the library. Out the back, in Cataloguing, actually.”—I'm not gonna ask what the fuck they were doing out there, but she’s telling me anyway.—“He was looking for the Bibliographie de la France, you see, and I’d just popped in to see if my book order had come through—”

    “Had it?”

    “No. And I defy even the might of the Carrano Group to get a container-load of books out here in under three months!”

    Oh, yeah? “How long have ya been waiting for them?”

    Scowl. “Five months, actually, but— Yes! Shut up about your bloody pet shipping line, Jake! They put the dratted orders through in batches, and don’t tell me it’s not efficient!”

    “All right, I won’t, but it isn’t, if ya want the books to actually come. For that matter, if they’re urgent, couldn’t ya make them moos in the library order them air-freight? I know a joker that runs—”

    “Shut up, Jake. They’re all hidebound little public-servant clones that can’t see past the system they’ve always known, it isn’t gonna happen.”

    “Yeah. All right. So ya pounced on Rog and dragged ’im off to the staffroom for a beer, I geddit. So,”—wary look at the French doors but there’s no sign of ’im—“why bring him up here?”

    “To show him the lifestyles of the rich and famous Downunder, of course!”

    Silly grin. “Yeah, hah, hah.”

    “No, well, he’s lonely, poor thing: he doesn’t know a soul out here and of course Kevin McCaffery is the last man on earth to make a poor foreigner welcome, let alone put him in the picture about anything—he didn’t even realise where Puriri Campus is!”

    “Coulda looked at a map, couldn’t ’e?”

    “No, that’s my point, he didn’t realise he’d have to, you see: Kevin just informed him blithely that his tutorials would all be up at Puriri and didn’t explain where it is! And, um, well, I explained all that, and, um, Rod came in, and I could see Roger was totally taken aback, sort of looking more lost than ever, and he doesn’t understand anything about the New Zealand lifestyle, Jake, the poor man’s totally dépaysé!”

    Day—Aw. Right, goddit. Come to think of it, there isn’t an English word, no. Homesick? Not quite that. Um, halfway between homesick and at a loss, I s’pose. Yeah, good word: chalk one up to the Frogs, eh?

    “I was thinking, Jake—”

    Ouch, here it comes. “Yeah?”

    “Could he rent that third chalet of yours, do you think? The one at the far end of the track.”

    At the far end of the track and next to hers, is what she means. Well, there’s a small field between them, but yeah. The other one’s down near the road, more convenient, but she liked the middle one better, it wasn’t just the view, they’ve all got a decent view of the sea, but it’s got the old farm orchard behind it, and there’s a turning circle outside it, means she can get the car in and out easy enough.

    Look, if he does that, we’ll never be rid of the tit! She’s looking all hopeful, shit. “Well, no reason why not, but has ’e got transport?”

    “Um, well, as a matter of fact he can’t drive—”

    “EH?”

    “Ssh! It doesn’t matter, he can get the workers’ bus into Puriri when he’s got classes there, and if I'm going into the City Campus I can always give him a lift, or he can—”

    Yeah, yeah. Got it all worked out, apparently. “Yeah, all right, if young Rod takes that first chalet up near the letterboxes he can give him a lift, too, if the old banger’s actually going. Has Rog actually taken a dekko at the chalet?”

    The answer is yes and he called it a charming cottage. Aw, gee, did ’e really?

    “All right, if he thinks he can cope with living up here with no transport, of course he can have the flaming chalet, Pol, it’s only sitting  there going begging, isn’t it?”

    Beaming smile. Jesus, why? We’ll never be rid of the tit, and I’ll take me dying oath she doesn’t even think he’s fanciable!

    “S’pose you were the sort of kid that brought home—it wouldn’t of been stray cats or dogs, on the farm—stray dumb animals that yer poor Mum and Dad hadda cope with, eh?”

    She gulps, I got her there! “Um, I did once bring home a magpie with a wounded wing. I put it in a shoebox with a lot of cotton wool, and Mum gave it a little bit of cake.”

    Cake, or, maggie food. “And?”

    ’Nother gulp. “Dad took one look at it and wrung its neck. He said it was cruel not to put it out of its misery.”

    “Good on ’im. And?”

    “Um, Mum and me both bawled,” she says in this tiny voice. Jesus God Almighty, could of sworn for a minute, there, I actually saw plump little Polly, aged about eight, with her hair in untidy plaits, standing there in her little scruffy overalls in her mum's kitchen, bawling her heart out!

    “Uh—yeah. Too soft-hearted for your own good, sweetheart.”

    Wobbly smile. “Mm. I s’pose I take after Mum.”

    Exactly. She hasn’t said all that much about her, but from what I can gather the woman’s as soft as butter. One of those big, plump, vague motherly women, y’know? Pretty dumb, mind you, though the brains are partly on her side, old Vi was always sharp as a tack. Must’ve skipped the mum, that’s for sure. Sort that was only ever interested in marriage and a family. Well, nothing wrong with that, though you’d have to be the type that could take the bawling that goes along with it and, after the first flush had worn off—which would take a while, she’s shown me a photo of her mum when young and she was very much the same physical type as Polly, bit plumper, but very like her—well, after a quite a few years the boredom of never being able to open yer mouth and say what you were thinking and be sure of being understood would kinda get to you. I think.

    “Aw, there you are, Rog. Didn’t get lost, didja?”

    Silly smile. “I’m afraid I did, Jake! I’m terribly sorry, I didn’t mean to wander round your house! I think I must have turned left instead of right—”

    Yeah, yeah, par for the course. Well, yeah, that’s a wounded maggie in human form if ever I saw one.

Dear Diary,

    My God, where do I start? My life has changed forever. I should feel an utter idiot writing that, yet I don’t. Possibly that’s indicative of how much everything has changed. All I did was go to the university library. True, I suppose in the course of things we would have met anyway, but it wasn’t the course of things, it was today. Polly. She’s—everything. Bright, beautiful, kind, with the frankest, friendliest smile I’ve ever seen. Did she notice I’m alive? Well, yes. That much: yes. But as to whether I’ll ever mean anything to her—

    I must do. She must, we must. It can’t mean nothing: I came to the other side of the world to find her!

    Let me get it down before I degenerate entirely into rapturous nothings.

    I went to the university library. The girl beneath the big sign that said “REFERENCE” had one of those perfect tans that until a few days ago I believed existed only in coloured advertisements for holidays in the South of France, or vapid American films. At home we’d call that a sundress, surely? Why can I never cope properly with these desk persons? The damned girl wasn't even looking at me, yet she must have known I was there! “Er, can you help me, please?” She switched her attention to that familiar point about six inches above and behind my left ear. Eventually, however, we got to the point where I was ordered to “full thus un.”

    N.B., must stop trying to transliterate the damned accent, that way madness lies.

    The bloody girl then discovered from the information on my request slip, which merely repeated the verbal information I had already given her, that I didn’t need to full ut un after all, as the volume was un Ketteloguing. No, I am stopping. “In Cataloguing. Through there.” All I could see was a perfectly blank door in the back wall of the library. No notice, not even “Private” or Staff Only” or—I knocked, anyway. No response. Very well. I went in.

    There was no-one in sight. I browsed slowly along the bookshelves, rounded a stack, and stopped short.

    A girl was standing in profile to me, head bent, gravely consulting a book. A long, thick, golden-brown plait hung down her back. Soft curly wisps waved gently round her neck and ears. She glanced up without haste and turned to face me, smiling. My senses swam. Tight navy jeans, and an apple-green top, cut off raggedly above her waist, exposing a strip of smooth, honey-tan skin. Long, smooth, honey-tan bare arms, full breasts under the apple-green… An oval face, the nose small, but not too small, the chin rounded but firm, the mouth… Soft, pink, tender, the short upper lip deliciously curved. Grey eyes? No, hazel—green—haze— Could she help me? I’d let her lead me to Hell, let alone to a French bibliography!

    When we’d found the Bibliographie I plucked up the courage to ask her name. Polly. Oh, God, Polly!

The morrow.

    Decided not to bother with going down to breakfast this morning. Did I come over as a hopeless wet last night? Undoubtedly, yes. That Carrano chap is so bloody macho. Actually that isn’t the right word. Masculine. Curse him.

    What did I write last night? Ugh. A few lacunae there. I may as well admit it, Dear Diary, I did not realize who she was. I was so bowled over by her (see above)— But that’s no excuse. I did not realize who she was. It didn’t dawn until I’d asked her if she’d published that she’s the P.M. Mitchell who wrote Analyse statistique et analyse littéraire. I might just as well have cut my throat there and then. She’s read my meagre published articles, but then, I suppose they all looked me up.

    Looking back, I can’t help wondering why the Hell she invited me to Carrano’s place with her. Well—merely being kind to the odd foreigner? Think so, yes. Not in the hope of making him jealous? No, that would be flattering myself. And then, Polly is very much not that sort: I’d take my dying oath there isn’t a devious bone in her delicious body. Oh, Polly…

    Damn it. I’m going to stop drivelling and go for a walk. Humid Hell-hole though the place is.

Later.

    Anticlimax, best describes today. Have decided not to go down to dinner. Head thumping and face very painful. How do the locals cope with this heat? Will have to buy something for sunburn. Tomorrow. Oh: Sunday. Well, it may to have wait until Monday.

    So much for the much-quoted little Britain of the South Pacific! When I think of the number of idiots who assured me it’d be just like home—! Not a mention of the humidity. Which, Dear Diary, proves I wasn’t wrong to ignore their every syllable, doesn’t it?

    Oh, Polly!