The One with the Upgrade

The Girl and I decided to take advantage of cheap Eurostar tickets to fulfill one of my European goals - spend a whole weekend eating/drinking only waffles, mussels and beer. It was also a good opportunity to check out a few statues of children and dogs urinating. For the uneducated - these goals can all be achieved in Brussels...

We met at St Pancreas demolished some sushi and wine in fairly quick fashion before heading for our train. As we approached our carriage the attendent turned us back revealing that there was no airconditioning here and we would be directed elsewhere into the business class seats. As we approached there was a small queue and it was clear they were struggling to find everybody seats.

As we got to the front of the line a rude couple pushed in front of us which was pretty amusing to me although they copped a rough serve from the girl. I pulled her aside to explain they would not exactly leave us behind - although her point was she didn't want to miss out on the business class upgrade. After they had seated everone else the train manager spoke to a few of his colleagues and it was apparent we would not be in this carriage.

"Follow me," he explained, "I have a special carriage for you." He then escorted us to a private room at the front of the carriage - with two large chairs and a couch. We reclined back into our chairs and left the door open. Quite a few people walked past and jealously looked in and it became even better after we opened our bottle of champagne.

Eventually the rude couple walked past, pausing in disbelief, with their jaws ajar before I reached over and with a smug smile slid the door closed. We could hear the woman berating the man as they wandered off down the corridor to the echoes of our laughter.