Monday 1^st December

Early down to shipping company where after much to do, we left our little VW locked up in a shop (this was under custom supervision so that we could have our passports and other documents cleared before leaving the country). Hope we see it again.

It looked very sad all covered in protective wax and stripped of everything removable (‘cos of dockers' light fingers etc). I was really doubtful whether we would see it again in one piece as there’s a dock strike on – no one knows when it will be settled.

We joined Bani and a very attractive friend for Chinese nosh and spent the afternoon finally packing and taking cases to Lufthansa office. For dinner we took a taxi to the Luft’ engineer’s house for a great meal. His wife was in Australia visiting her mother so the bloke was making hay while the sun shone. Another friend of his was there and the four of us had a very pleasant evening.