AMERICA

We landed at Logan airport, Boston,

a right dump it was,

all broken pipes

and leaking roofs

We breezed through customs

and clambered on a train,

at least I think it was a train

It being 10pm and with

us being in a new country and all

I thought this a pertinent moment to consider

the matter of accommodation.

I asked the bloke sitting

next to me if he knew

of a cheap hotel.

“Yeah, sure” he said

“stop after next, right outside

the train station”

'Cheap' is a relative

term I guess, we did

not find 150 dollars a night

cheap.

We decided to wander

around a bit in search

of something a little more

suited to our flimsy budget

Within a very short space of time

we found ourselves

in what I presume is the

financial hub of the city.

Towering skyscrapers

lurked over us.

The mighty omnipotent shapes

of stereotypically

American office blocks

housing the usual band

of tainted villains

soared pompously up

into the skies

The strangest thing

about this scenario

was there was not a soul in sight,

not the slightest hint of a human

and no traffic either.

We had just five minutes earlier

stepped off a plane onto a new

continent and we were now

wandering utterly alone

through an eerie

Night of the living dead v Wall Street

type landscape

It was both creepy and

bewitching,

we had no idea what to do,

we continued our aimless

wander,

sort of mesmerised

by the novelty

and ghostliness

of everything

It didn't take long for

our reverie to be shattered.

A taxi appeared out of nowhere,

the driver wound down his window

and ordered us to get in.

We got in.

“So what are you people doing and

where are you going?” said

the driver

or something else equally practical

It was a reasonable enough question,

somehow we had

great difficulty in

answering it.

After listening to us faff about

for a while, he brusquely interrupted,

“Come on guys focus, FOCUS!”

His determined insistence

reaped its benefits,

we managed to garble out

something about looking for

somewhere cheap to stay

He took us to

the American equivalent

of a B&B which

was pretty expensive

but not 150 dollars.

The next day I got it

together, and found

somewhere reasonable.

Actually

looking back

I think  arriving

in 'The New World'

utterly unprepared and

utterly clueless

was not quite
as stupid a venture
as it  might at first seem