Big Mc

Life isn’t like the movies.  It’s not even like TV, least of all reality TV.  If life was like the movies I’d have had an immediate reward for going to McDonalds on Friday morning.  Is that how you spell it?  McDonalds?  So how come it’s a Big Mac and not a Big Mc?  Surely the pronunciation of Big Mc would be more appropriate?  Not that anyone in Australia ever calls it McDonalds.  It’s macca’s mate and don’t you forget it.  The branch of maccas I walk past on the way to work everyday takes up a corner of the Sydney Entertainment Centre and it’s hardly a flagship.  I don’t know why anyone would want to wipe a burger on a window, but surely someone could wipe it off again?  Anyway, this corner of the Entertainment Centre – across from Paddy’s Markets and just outside Chinatown – is a favourite haunt of several homeless guys of the beard-and-checked-shirt variety.  This is probably because the doors of Centre are deep and can relied on to provide shelter in even the heaviest rain.  Good shelter, easy access to cheap food, what’s not to love?   Now, I don’t normally take much notice of these guys but on Friday our never-ending summer ended, the sky turned grey and it was suddenly freeeezing.  OK, not freezing, not even cold by US/UK winter standards but chillier than you’d want to sleep out in.  As I pass, the homeless guys are just getting up, lighting up the remains of cigarettes and drinking some urine-yellow substance out of old water bottles.  Whereas me, I’m well-fed, well-slept and on the way to a warm office.  So I go into macca’s and buy four large cups of tea.  Now, you probably know that in each country McDonalds is a little different.  In Germany they selll beer, in Sweden the staff don’t have acne and in Australia they are really (really) slow.  On the rare occasion I go to a macca’s I swear next time I will film the people who work there and send the footage to an anthropologist or a sociologist or someone who can tell me how and why otherwise normal people move so slowly behind the counter of a macca’s.  I asked for four large teas and it took three and a half minutes to get the order into the till.  And yes, I know the joy of middle-age is that you learn to slow down but there are limits.  Maybe I should get a job at macca’s?  Would that stop me wanting to scream at the girl ‘Come on!  I’m being charitable here but only if it takes less than five minutes!!!’.  Anyway, half an hour later the teas are ready so I carry them out to the homeless guys.  One of them is banging something into his knee with his forehead while another gives him directions.   A third is staring at the queue of fat teenagers which has materialised outside the door to the Entertainment Centre.    Where did they come from?  There are at least two dozen of them, slouched or cross-legged in an untidy line across the cold concrete, playing with their hair and looking at their phones.  I stand there, four supersized teas steaming on a plastic tray, staring at them until the fourth homeless guy coughs and I say ‘Oh yeah.  How you going?’.  He squints at me, nods and coughs again.  ‘Thought you guys might want a hot drink’ I say.  At this point, in the movie, an elderly man is just passing in his limo and says ‘Gosh, what a thoughtful young man.  At last, someone worthy to inherit my endless fortune.’  In reality the homeless guy says ‘Alright’ and I put the tea down on the plastic table between us.  For some reason at this point most of the queue of fat teenagers loses interest in their phones and hair and instead looks over at me and the homeless guys and the tea.  Soon they’re staring in that way only fat teenagers can.

‘Alright?’ I say to the nearest girl, cross-legged about three metres away.  She has pigtails, an unfortunate chin and no-one to tell her she’s too big for lycra.  ‘What are you guys queuing up for?’

‘A gig’ she says.

I resist sarcasm – I’m a nice charitable guy remember – and ask who’s on.

‘Ocean’ she says shyly.  By now the rest of the queue is transfixed.  Who’s this weirdo with a beard and what does he want?  So, sensibly, I say ‘Cool’ and carry on to work.  Don’t I.  Don’t I?

‘Ocean?’ I say in my best English accent.  ‘Did you say “Ocean”?’

‘Asian’ she says, a little louder this time but still half-swallowing her answer.

‘Asian?’

Whereupon the homeless guy who had been headbanging into his knee stands upright and shouts with such fury that the speckles of his saliva sparkle silver in the morning sun.

‘ED SHEERAN!!’

And the entire fat queue dissolves into helpless laughter.  I turn, just a paragraph too late, and continue on my way to work.