Infamy

Infamy, they've all got it in for me, to quote Kenneth Williams in Carry on Cleo.

Last Sunday was the Bahnhofsfest, one I missed from my fest list the other week, not because I forgot about it (although that's also a factor) but also because it wasn't a fest in the true German, Kettwig meaning of the word - no all day drinking and music in the middle of town for the 36 hours of the weekend. This was 1 day, hardly a fest more of an 'open day' with lots of activities going on to showcase what the Alter Bahnhof offers the population of Kettwig & surroundings, there was a bit of theatre, ballet, 1 to 1 gymnastic (they never mean gymnastic in the manner of triple somersaults and vaulting, here they mean more of a muscular stretching kind of thing) dance workout, yoga, hip hop, dance for the over 50's and step, the last 2 were both labelled 'mitmachen' so you could come along and join in, if you dared.

Petra our step teacher had told us weeks and weeks ago that this was coming up and had been coaching us in one of her complicated step routines, trying to ensure that we would all look proficient, which is fine, makes us all look...good (I hesitate to use the word as it makes us sound as though we're halfway proficient, the best that can be said on most weeks is that at least no one fell off or over their step) This was a good idea as at least we looked as though we knew what we were doing, however it also made damn sure that no-one was going to try and join in with us...

Like I said, this was on Sunday, we were all given a little bottle of Prosecco (just one glass's worth) and some chocolate as a thank you for agreeing to putting ourselves forward for this humiliation and then we were on, lots of people watching and the mandatory photographer from the local rag, who seemed to be there quite a while and so must have taken a fair few pics, so why is it that the one that makes it into today's paper shows just 2 of us (and I'm one of them) and we look as though we're trying to fly, he must had taken other, better photographs surely, ones that showed more of the step group than just 2, or maybe we were all so out of time and unco-ordinated that this was literally the only pic he got where 2 people are actually synchronised? That wouldn't surprise me one bit. On the upside, at least the pic isn't on the internet, trust me, I've looked, backwards, sideways, anyway you can think of, it's not there, so you'll just have to imagine it, me in black leggings and a white vest (that was possibly as co-ordinated as we got, all in monchrome) one foot on the step the other lifted up and in the air, hands and arms raised up and above my head, head tilted down with eyes firmly fixed on feet to reduce chance of falling over - I look as though I'm trying to fly (if you've ever seen the film 'Karate Kid' then this is the crane pose from that film) and it's a damn big picture too, if only I'd sucked my belly in and not been looking down, or stood where Rebecca was (only her knee made it into the paper) or maybe I should have just stayed at home!