Le Lavandou in the early evening
Until I was 22, my foreign travel was limited to a couple of holidays in the Irish Republic, though I had been to Colwyn Bay and Clacton as well as to several towns dotted around the country visited by Sunderland AFC.
Despite a few trips to France to be presented to and get to know la belle famille - a.k.a the sceptical prospective in-laws - this essentially sheltered life continued for a while.
Slowly, work and holidays began to take me further afield. My world has not shrunk to the extent that I can claim to have seen all or even a great part of it, but I suppose the list has become reasonably varied: most of Europe, South Africa, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, Libya, Algeria, Morocco, US, Canada, Peru, much of the Caribbean, Vietnam, Thailand, Pakistan, Singapore, Oman, Bahrain and other bits I've doubtless overlooked.
And in the past three years and a bit, I have come to consider myself a resident of France.
On Sunday, I fly to my fresh life in Abu Dhabi, and the challenge of helping to launch a new daily newspaper is an exciting one.
I will not feel remotely sad about leaving Britain behind again. I have family, friends and football team here and all are important to me. But there is nothing else that makes me want to stay here a moment longer than necessary.
It has nothing, or at least not that much, to do with my struggles with BT and other UK bodies with an aversion to providing a decent public service.
My experiences with that company have, incidentally, reminded me that escalators go downwards as well as up. Maybe I should not really be quite so cross that despite BT pledges to "escalate" my order, in fact no service will be installed before I leave, whereas it was originally promised for October 3.
Memo to self: do not confuse escalate with expedite.
Call centres and sluggish or stationary automated phone queuing systems are indeed a curse of modern life, and I have found this to be several times worse in Britain than in the supposedly stifling and ultra-bureaucratic atmosphere of France. Others may well have different stories to tell, but dealing with such people - or, more often, machines - has been a peculiarly stressful part of my 17 or 18 days back "home".
Nor will I miss being charged £5.20 for a hot dog - one moist sausage in a dry bun, drink (not Cristal champagne) thrown in but no trace of an onion - at the Arsenal football stadium, which bears the name of the country in which I am to make my home.
But it runs deeper. I have simply become more and more attached to France, and especially to the sunny, outdoor, not-far-from-the-sea life of my most recent few months there (I do not especially miss Paris). There will be no shortage of sunshine where I am going, but I know I will think often of the Var.
So farewell to London, leafy and grand
in parts but infuriating as a whole.
Salut!, as I have already promised, will continue. The exact form is still a matter for reflection, but I have more or less decided for the time being to keep the title of the site unchanged.
My next posting will come from the Emirates - and I don't mean the one near Highbury -and will fall into the new category of Salut! Salam, but I do not feel it is necessary to go further and mess around with the banner (beyond tweaking the description of my site).
I hope you all feel inclined to follow me. When I say "all", I am not sure what I mean. The hit rate for Salut! is a constant source of mystery to me.
It is not hard to understand why the number of visits to my more specific sites, Salut! Live and Salut! Sunderland, should soar from time to time. It is invariably the result of a reference to one or other of them appearing elsewhere, prompting new people to take a peek.
Salut!'s figures move in less fathomable ways. I do little active promotion of the site, yet the numbers will sometimes stretch to several hundred "hits" in one day for no more apparent reason than when they dip to 100-150.
But I am profoundly grateful to everyone who did follow me here from that Other Place, where massive resources have not translated into unfailingly impressive results for individual bloggers.
It was rather gratifying to learn the other day that interest in my "archived" Telegraph blog - that is shunted to one side and not at all easy to locate - was somewhat greater than that shown in the "live" blog of the man who fired me (his was quickly "archived", too, after he found it impossible even to honour a commitment to post some new thoughts once a week).
So Salut! and Salam, and another au revoir. Enjoy this sporting weekend - momentous for those who adore rugby and international football, less so for those of us who don't - and come back this way in the coming days and weeks.
Travel safely. You're in for an exciting (and no doubt sometimes nerve-racking)time. I envy you. I kinda envy the people who are coming from here to join you but that's a youngster's game.
By the way, Graham Robb's book is tremendous. Thank you, again. I'm halfway through it already; it's quite fascinating and beautifully written.
I'm no great aficionado of rugby but I'm hoping for a France-Argentina final, away from most people's expectations.
Posted by: Bill Taylor | October 12, 2007 at 02:35 PM
As someone who now lives in the Var but has many memories of life in the Trucial States before the oil boom, I look forward to your reports on life as it is now. Next summer try to imagine your life without air conditioning, cold storage etc!
Posted by: DerekR | October 12, 2007 at 03:13 PM
Beware! The further you remove yourself from your usual haunts, ColinR, the greater the temptation for near strangers to call by and ask:
"Hello Mr.Randall, I know you're a long way from home, but does the name xxxxxx mean anything to you?"
Better go ex-directory ! Or give up blogging !
Posted by: ColinB | October 12, 2007 at 08:52 PM
Bon voyage, Colin. Looking forward to your next post from the Emirates...and good luck in your new venture!
Posted by: Gigi | October 13, 2007 at 05:44 PM
> and so long, at least for now.
Enjoy Abu Dhabi - and some better value than Arsenal can offer ...
Posted by: Roads | October 13, 2007 at 11:31 PM
Please try to keep Salut alive. I am sure your posts on life in the Emirates would offer some rare insight on this dynamic part of the world.
Posted by: Robert Marchenoir | October 14, 2007 at 02:10 PM
I'll be following you to your New Place, Colin. Just think, you might even be able to access my blog there! Although you will probably no longer have the time to read it. Such is life!
Hope you have a blast in Abu Dhabi, and I don't mean a heat blast!
Posted by: Sarah | October 14, 2007 at 06:44 PM
Hello Bill, it's a long time since we've communicated. With your great skill at forecasting rugby results, please go for South Africa!
Posted by: Phil Randall | October 15, 2007 at 11:02 PM
Touche, Phil!!
Actually, I do now fancy the Springboks.....
Posted by: Bill Taylor | October 16, 2007 at 12:07 AM
Hi Colin,
I'm joining the Abu Dhabi paper as a copy editor in January. Just thought I'd say hello before I arrive in the Emirates.
David
Posted by: David O'Mahony | November 17, 2007 at 02:30 AM