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John's Soap Box

April 24, 2006

I’m feeling rather Andy Rooney-ish today, so maybe I’ll use it to get a couple of things out of my craw that have been irritating me.

As I mentioned elsewhere I recently returned from the Frankfurt Music Messe, where, this year, an insidious leg infection obliged me to participate in a wheelchair.
This was my first experience of everyday living as one who is handicapped.
It was an eye-opener!

We checked into a super new hotel - and discovered that they hadwheelchair accessible rooms. 
Ten minutes later I, my wife Linda, our luggage - and a small guitar, brought with me to discourage me from buying a guitar at the show - were in the room, and a happy Afghani bell-hop was pocketing a twenty Euro note as he made his way back down to the elevators.

After attempting to close the door - no mean feat as its width was greater than the length of my arm, meaning that in order to have the door closed one would have ended up out in the corridor - I decided to try out the handicap accessible bathroom facilities.

Now, I have been in hotel bathrooms that are handicap accessible before. Often those are the only rooms that are available if one checks into a hotel late at night - and, standing there at the porcelain, I have oft times mused upon how wonderful it is that, nowadays, those less fortunate souls have facilities that are purpose-built to be easy to use.
HAH!

I suppose that, if one were an Olympic athlete, those facilities would prove to be without hazard. The cute parallel bars on either side of the hopper, for instance - so cunningly arranged that, no matter how you approach them, the toilet is still just that little bit out of reach.
The one on the right is so designed that it can be raised to vertical to allow it to come crashing down upon the head of anyone foolish enough to try to slide underneath it onto the toilet seat.

Then the wash-hand basin. How clever to arrange it that, unless one’s arms are chimp-like, it is totally impossible to reach the faucets.

One should not forget the shower also, with its little seat hooked onto a grab-bar on the wall. The contortions one has to perform in order to swing across, off the wheelchair, and onto the tiny seat are both obscene and hilarious. Those necessary to a successful return journey are best left to the imagination.

As I struggled to perform certain functions that are best performed in private - and with the door closed - I thought how similar all this was to the obstacle course I underwent during basic training at RAF Locking when I was eighteen.
On second thoughts the Locking course was a push-over!

At long last, exhausted - and semi-abluted - I made for the bed, only to discover that the ‘pathway’ between the bed and the wall was too narrow to accommodate the wheelchair. A telephone call down to the front desk elicited the suggestion that I move the bed.
Closer inspection revealed that it was on a heavy metal frame.
Just how, I asked, was someone in a wheelchair supposed to do this?
Ten minutes later a bell-hop appeared - and the bed was moved.

 

Since a wheelchair is rather awkward in a restaurant situation we decided to get room service each evening. Trade show hotels are notorious for their room service prices, but usually the food is good and well presented.
A look at the room service menu showed that they were right up there with their prices - but, what the heck. I always wanted to try a twenty-five buck hamburger.

I’ve been living here in Germany for the past eighteen months and the thought of a thick, juicy, hamburger with extra onion and pickle - and golden fries  - was  irresistible.
What finally arrived was a carbonized hockey-puck in a soggy roll with five small burnt pieces of potato trying very hard to look like French fries.
Linda ordered a mushroom  pizza which resembled a Frisbee-sized hard-tack biscuit bearing half a dozen canned mushrooms and four strips of half-melted cheese. Surprisingly she ate it!

This was to set the seal for room service for the week.

We always book rooms on the Executive floor at trade show hotels because of the excellent lounges, where drinks are free, and every afternoon at five o’clock cold snacks and hot food are provided, also free of charge.
The food is always delicious.
How is it, I wonder, that the same kitchens can produce such dreadful food, when it is ordered as room service ?

Just one more handicap grouch.
At the Messe there are a number of handicap accessible toilets on the show floor. However, should one need to use one of them, it is first necessary to find the Hall Manager - not an easy task! – then the two of you must go together to the handicap toilet, where amidst much key jangling TWO locks are turned, and the door is opened.
All this can take close to an hour.
I can vouch for the fact that, for someone in a wheelchair, this can be just a little too long to wait.

 

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