Eighteen Days Until Egypt

Babette’s family holiday has not started yet, but the adventure already has: expired passports, four-train journeys, three essential blankets and the promise of a piña colada beside the pool.

There are 18 days until Babette goes to Egypt.

Not approximately 18 days. Babette has done the calculation properly. She knows the days, the hours and even the minutes. The holiday was only booked a few days ago, so there has not been much time for that slow, dreamy feeling of knowing that somewhere in the distant future you are going away. This holiday is suddenly very real.

For seven nights, Babette, her husband and the children will stay at an all-inclusive hotel in Egypt. It will be the children’s first time on an aeroplane, and they are not quite sure yet what they think about that. Flying is one of those things that sounds exciting when you have never done it, right up until you realise that you actually have to get onto the plane.

The hotel, however, is easier to understand. There are swimming pools and water slides. There is a buffet. There is ice cream. When one of the children wanted to know what “all-inclusive” actually meant, Babette explained it in the most useful way possible: everything has already been paid for.

Food? Yes.

Drinks? Yes.

Ice cream? A definitive yes!

Suddenly, all-inclusive makes perfect sense.

Babette’s own plans for Egypt are equally clear. She does not seem interested in turning seven days away into an exhausting programme of activities.

“I relax,” she says. “I do nothing. I lie by the swimming pool, and I will be chilling.”

Then she adds the detail that completes the picture: cocktails. Perhaps a piña colada.

There is only one problem with this peaceful vision of Babette beside the swimming pool.

First, she has to get there.

The flight leaves Cologne at around three in the morning, which has turned the journey to the airport into a small mathematical exercise. Babette has already investigated the possibilities. They could drive, but then there is fuel and airport parking to pay for. They could use public transport, which is included with the holiday ticket, but that means taking a bus and several trains.

Four changes altogether.

Four opportunities for something to go wrong.

And Babette knows exactly where the weakness in that plan lies.

The German train, she says, is “not every time on time.”

There is a big difference between missing a connection when you are going somewhere ordinary and standing on a platform with your family, your suitcases and a flight to Egypt getting closer by the minute.

So the calculations continue. How much would parking cost? How long would the drive take? How early would they need to leave? Is saving the money worth trusting four connections?

There are still 18 days to decide.

Then there are the passports.

Babette found the old ones and discovered that they belonged rather firmly to the past. Hers expired in February 2021. Her husband’s expired in August 2020.

Oops.

Normally, getting new passports would take several weeks. Several weeks are not especially useful when your flight leaves in 18 days, so Babette has already investigated the express option. It costs more, but it should arrive within days. Now there are photographs to arrange and documents to organise.

The closer the conversation gets to Babette’s plan to “do nothing,” the more things appear that she has to do first.

There are passports. There is transport. There is packing. There is a dentist appointment. There is the beginning of school to think about. There is even a birthday just before the family leaves, and Babette has adjusted the plans so that a birthday sleepover can still happen.

And then there are the blankets.

One of the children has three cosy blankets that matter very much. Babette has suggested that perhaps only one needs to travel to Egypt.

This does not appear to be a particularly popular proposal.

“She needs all the three,” Babette says.

Forget passports and airport parking. The true logistical challenge may be getting three essential blankets into the luggage.

Somewhere inside all this planning, though, there is something new waiting for the family. The children will experience flying for the first time. They will arrive in a country they have not experienced together before. There will be new food, new surroundings and the strange first morning of waking up somewhere far from home.

There are water slides too.

Will Babette try them?

“Maybe.”

The answer comes with conditions. She is not exactly enthusiastic about the idea. If the water is warm enough — perhaps around 30 degrees — she might consider it.

“I think I will try this, but I don’t like it.”

Perhaps that is where curiosity becomes interesting. It does not always look like somebody confidently running towards the unknown. Sometimes curiosity stands at the top of the water slide, looks down and thinks: Hmm. Maybe.

You can be curious about a new country and still want your familiar blanket. You can look forward to travelling and still worry about the flight. You can want an adventure while calculating airport parking. You can try something new without needing to try everything.

Babette does not need to arrive in Egypt as a completely different person. She can take her family, their uncertainty, their luggage and possibly three blankets with her.

For now, the holiday still exists mostly in preparation: passports, photographs, trains, parking, appointments, packing and questions.

But the countdown is running.

Soon the calculations will be finished. The suitcases will be closed. The first flight will no longer be something the children are wondering about; it will be something they have done.

And somewhere on the other side of all that organisation, Babette will finally reach the part she has been planning from the beginning.

A swimming pool.

Nothing to do.

A cocktail in her hand.

Perhaps a piña colada.

And maybe — if the water is warm enough — a water slide.

When Babette comes home, she already knows one thing for certain.

“Then I have a lot of stories.”