Guy Gadney versus the volcano: From MIPTV to Race Around The World
With flights in Europe cancelled because of the Icelandic volcano, Australians attending MIPTV in Cannes are among those facing gruelling journeys. In this guest posting, AIMIA president Guy Gadney shares his adventures
It is natural that a major natural thump like a volcano should have a knock-on effect on reality. As news spread through the annual MIPTV conference, panic responses became evident from execs who the day before had been the most confident television folk in the world. This is my story.
The first surreal moment happened striaght away. I was in the shower after a heavy night networking and drinking rose wine. (Aside: I never drink rose unless I am in France, and then I only drink rose. I do not smoke unless I am in Cannes when I smoke Gauloises Blonde like a… well, volcano). In the shower the soap dish was at eye level and so directly in front of me was the small hotel bottle of shampoo. On the back in large letters was the command “Avoid eye contact”. I instinctively turned away to stop looking at it and got out of the shower. I gave the bottle a quick sideways glance uneasily as I left my room, and deadlocked the door.
Out in the Palais des Festivals, it was dawning that having the whole of UK airspace closed was going to impact everyone. This appeared to be a major issue for most people who absolutely had to get to other conferences, meetings, loved ones, dinners in other countries. I tried to reassure them that actually these were not that important in the grander scheme of things, and that a volcano erupting and covering most of northern Europe’s stratosphere with a sulfuric cloud was probably a valid excuse. I was also still preoccupied that a small bottle of shampoo had instructed me to stop looking at it, and so a volcano erupting was just another surreal thing to add to the list.
The situation was therefore all about how to get home. Given that the largest episode of Race Around The World had just started since Germany invaded Poland, I also figured that any bright idea that I had would undoubtedly be shared by half a million others. This was the time to zig when everyone else was zagging.
To be fair I had my own personal deadline to be back in London for the weekend as I was looking forward to catching up with my sister who I had not seen for a long time, and who was going to meet me in London when she got back from a short break in Italy. We had worked to get our flight times closely synchronized so I was upset that I was going to have to break the plans.
With the other Aussies in MIP we talked about taking the Eurostar to Paris and then to London. A lovely romantic European journey speeding through the French wine countryside at an epilepsy-inducing speed. But half a million people had also thought of this and the trains were already full for four days. A few Eurostar employees had also realised this and had put up the price of a single train ticket to 900 Euros. Given the train workers were also on strike, the French rapidly became a “target demographic” for all the wrong reasons. We spent most of dinner that evening trying to find a translation for “cheese-eating surrender monkeys”.
We looked into renting a car and driving, but I have a feeling half a million other people had also thought of this and the Channel Tunnel would be seeing stationary traffic for a while.
In a moment of genius (well, more of a creeping realization of a good idea but it was the fastest thought I had had all morning), it dawned on me that my dear sister in Italy would also be struggling to get back to London, so why not just hop on a train to Italy.
I had inter-railed a few times as a teenager and the rail networks could not have possibly changed in the past twenty years, so packed up early on Friday morning and, dragging suitcases so heavy that they could have stopped any airplane far more effectively than a volcanic cloud, I walked through the cobbled streets of Cannes to the train station.
Feeling very happy to be setting off on a European adventure again, I bought my ticket and ran onto the train which had mysteriously appeared twenty minutes before its scheduled time. Just as I was about to dive through the closing train doors, the nice lady who ran the B&B appeared like magic next to me. I must have given her the same sideways glance I gave the shampoo bottle, as she said: “Monsieur, votre carte de credit” which I must have left on the counter when I was paying for the room. I gave her an enormous and slightly incredulous Thank You” before grabbing the card like Indiana Jones’ hat before the doors completed their guillotine closure. The French have successfully managed to filter their French Revolution death technology subtly into their current day public transport system.
Given I was crossing from French to Italian rail networks, I could not buy tickets for the Italian section, or even find a train schedule, so Zenned out again, figured I had a full day and now with a credit card, everything was going to be fine.
I had my first train change at Nice to catch the next train to the Italian border town of Ventimiglia. The platform number for this train changed three times in the ten minutes before the train arrived. If this were Central Station, it would not have been so much of an issue as all platforms are easily accessed by walking to end of the platform and moving to the next one. In these stations, all platform access involves going down a couple of flights of stairs to the pedestrian tunnel under the platforms, and then back up again when you reach the platform number. A subconscious thought dropped into my head wondering how my chiropractor is.
On board the train I realised that I had been right that nothing had changed in the past twenty years. At all. In fact I might even have been in this very carriage when I was travelling in Italy before.
Anyway, with time on my hands I thought it would be a good moment to catch up on admin and recharge the prepaid local mobile I had. After all, I needed to text the crew in Cannes that all was well and I had not just disappeared, and I needed to text my sister that I was coming to see her in Florence.
The train route between Cannes and Ventimiglia hugs the mountainous coastline, providing stunning and luxurious views of the small towns and villages and the Mediterranean glistening temptingly in between the tunnels that have been cut into the mountain to form the railways. I made a discovery on the journey that open air views last almost exactly the time it takes to phone the pre-paid recharge number, enter a 16 digital credit card and expiry date, but not quite long enough to listen the autovoice repeat the number so you can then press 1# to confirm the recharge before the train enters the tunnel and the line cuts out. I am absolutely not exaggerating that I repeated this routine seven times between seven consecutive tunnels before switching the phone off.
The journey was easy, punctuated only by every mobile in the carriage beeping simultaneously as the Italian phone networks SMSed their “welcome to Vodafone Italy” message.
In Ventimiglia, it was easy to buy a ticket to Florence. Well, easy once you realise that Florence is called Firenze in Italian, that you need three tickets instead of one, and that all of the automatic ticket machines declined my credit card.
- Guy Gadney is president of the Australian Interactive Media Industry Association and director of The Project Factory. Do not expect him back in Australia any time soon
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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This was a good read. Thanks, Guy.
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Lucky buggar. Rather be lost anywhere in Europe (even the ‘new’ part, or Iceland for that matter) than here doing salt mine duty. Sigh. Your recollections of dragging impossible suitcase over cobblestones (and the part about the rosé!!!) made me travel sick . . . (like home sick, only for travel).
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Enjoy the adventure mate!
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Looking forward to the collection of fridge magnets you end up with after this effort and we will test you on the name of the volcano. Tim, can you interview him on the video thingy when he gets back and get him to pronounce the name of it? Maybe after a bottle of wine?
To the other JB, salt mine duty? In this autumn Sydney weather? Commiserations are in order. Best get a job with Guy.
Cheers
JB
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JB – I have your fridge magnet. In fact you have the choice of a pizza fridge magnet, or a leg of ham fridge magnet.
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I’ll take them all. I see the Royal Navy is coming to get you.
Cheers
JB
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How is it that you (and everyone else) got stuck? And my new boss made his way back to these fair shores, by last monday morning….!?!
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