One Tiring Thursday

Normally, on Thursdays, the site isn't all that busy. Last night was an exception to that particular rule. I was expecting the routine return of several taxis from the town with their drunken passengers. I wasn't the only one who was surprised when a total of three taxis came back the entire night.

As I was walking around the site, checking to see where all the tents were situated and to establish who would be likely to cause problems during the forthcoming seven hours. One young male, who was with his girlfriend, decided to set a newspaper on fire when I was walking toward them. I just happened to have a bottle of water on me, as you do, so I took great pleasure in pouring it all over the barbecue. I then asked the male not to light any further fires or he, and his girlfriend, would be leaving the park.

When I went to lock up one of the blocks, I walked into the gents toilets to lock the showers, when I was approached by a small child.

"Do you work here?"
"Yes."
"Oh crap."

It was only later that I realised why he had said this to me. Him and his friend had dissected the broken hairdryer coil (the coil wasn't previously damaged, it just needed a new nozzle.). I know where your tent is, as I spoke to your father the previous evening.

I spoke to a number of tents about the noise levels, but two groups in particular. An English group (they had an accent, but I'm not entirely sure where they were from) and a group of Germans. The English contingent were incessant on making as much noise as possible until they saw it fit to go to bed. At two in the morning. The German, at least I think they were German, group wanted to get into an argument with me, so I walked away. On the last occasion when I spoke to the English crowd, two of the Germans walked away from the tent. This was after the laughing episode which had awoken the adjacent tent to them. When I walked up to the English tent, I gave them the final warning, the "shut up or leave" approach. Approximately ten seconds after I had said this to them, one of the females uttered the following,

"I can't believe he said that to us when he saw those guys walking away."

OK, so now I have to go and ask the Germans to go to bed and be silent. I walked over and gave them the same treatment, I was quite happy for them to finish their cigarette and go to bed. I waited around to ensure that they did as instructed. Which they did, about five minutes later.

At the same time as this was happening, I was walking through one of the fields when I heard someone trying to attract my attention. I ignored it at first, because I genuinely thought the male was trying to get the attention of his dog. Because that's exactly what it sounded like to me. After a while, I realised that he was wanting my attention. I walked over and his wife came out to speak to me. Apparently there was a female at reception whose child was having an asthma attack and couldn't get the gates open to leave for the hospital. I thanked the woman for this information and made my way swiftly to reception. There was no one there. Well, I tell a lie, just as I approached the reception, two cyclists approached me and asked if they could pitch their tent for the night. I dealt with them efficiently and walked back into the tent field to ascertain where the female was. As I was walking round, I heard someone running towards me across the grass, I shone my torch onto the grass to find out what was happening.

"Are you the warden?"
"Yes."
"Can you come to my mummy's tent, my little sister isn't well."

I followed the child to the tent to be met by a woman who was cradling her baby, which at the time was asleep and seemed oblivious to what was happening. The female then told me the details and she wasn't sure if she should take the child to hospital or not. She informed me that she would rather telephone the out of hours service. I couldn't understand this at all, the child seemed fine, but I insisted that there may be an underlying problem and it's best to get it checked out by the relevant medical bodies. The whole time I was stood there, the female decided to breastfeed the baby on several occasions, before saying:

"I can't keep feeding her all night." - Mother
"No, you'll get sore." - her older daughter, approximate age: 8 or 9

An intelligent child, some might say.

The process of swaying her to going to hospital took fifteen to twenty minutes. It obviously wasn't life-threatening. I said I would open the gates for her while she got some things together and got in her car. As I opened the gates, I heard the female noisily start her car and drive, rather loudly, toward the exit. She asked if she could get back in to which she was told, "No."

Later in the morning, I found what would possibly be the reason for her reluctance to go to the hospital. Judging by the large amount of empty wine bottles and general rubbish outside her tent, she was probably in no fit state to drive.

When I spoke to Alex this morning during the handover, he told me that there was a large number of groups booked in and to "be on my toes" at all times. I think I am psyched up enough for tonight.

Let's hope that tomorrow's blog posting will be an interesting one!