Please click here for, The Astolf Band (Part 3)
After a wonderful barbecue, they all went inside for some tea. Peter asked Paul, “What’s your plan for tomorrow?” Paul answered, “Since everyone is here, we’d better go back to England and start working for our concert. There would be a lot of things to do. We’ll first must make an announcement through the media, then we’ll have to plan for our concert”. “Okay,” said Peter “I’ll go upstairs and book my flight online. Paul shouted at Peter, “Don’t forget that we’ll be flying on the 1:00 am Qantas flight.
Very early the next morning, Martin woke up to a big roar. He went to the window and looked outside. “It is raining!” shouted Martin. He took his umbrella and ran outside. “Woo-hoooo!” shouted Martin excitedly, singing in the rain. Peter, who was in the kitchen, slicing the delicious, freshly made cheese for breakfast wondered what Martin was doing outside. Peter walked out and the happy Martin shouted excitedly, “Ooh! What a wonderful rain! I’ve been waiting to sing in the rain for so long.”
Peter pulled him inside and told him that a storm is coming. Martin had been very busy travelling to the big cities that he really missed singing in the rain like he used to do when ever the Astolf Band members were together in the countryside. “Storm?” asked Martin. He switched on the television to watch the news.
Eve woke up after a lightning struck the ground a thundering thunder roared outside her bedroom. It was very dark. “Blackout?” asked Paul who was using his laptop. He turned it off and went down stairs. Lin was walking out from her room when the lights suddenly went off. She went downstairs and asked, “Is it a blackout or somebody had switched off the electricity?” Martin answered, “A blackout!” while buttering the bread. “Ooh. That smells so good,” said Lin, walking to the dinning table. “Really tasty, you must try it,” said Paul while eating his bread. Peter said, “Home-made butter; my home-made butter. And also the freshly home-made bread”.
The bad storm was almost gone when they walked out to the car to go to the airport. Martin sat beside the driver seat and asked Peter,”Are you sure that we can catch our flight?” Peter answered, “I hope so”. After they’ve travelled about 6 kilometres, they realised that they were almost out of fuel. Peter stop by at the Caltex petrol station to refill the petrol and soon they were on the way to the airport.
Soon as the car was moving towards the Melbourne Airport, the car suddenly shook. “What’s wrong with the car?” asked Lin. “I think it must be the tyre!” said Peter. “We must have hit something sharp!” They went out to check the tyres. “Wild kangaroos!” shouted Martin. “They are coming our way, run!” They ran and ran and ran until they reached a petrol station nearby. The three wild kangaroos were still behind them. The cashier of the mart at the station saw the kangaroos chasing the friends. The cashier was also a cowboy who was very good at using the lasso.
He took out his lasso with a 10 metre rope, and lassoed the wild kangaroos one by one until he caught all of the kangaroos. They were amazed to see how the cashier lassoed the kangaroos, it was like watching a cowboy film. They thanked him and Martin asked him if he could help them to fix the tyre. “Of course!” said the cashier. They led him to the car and the cashier helped them to replace the tyre. “Thanks! We have something for you for helping us,” said Paul giving the cashier a fifty dollar note, “We would like to invite you to our concert in London. I’ll be sending a ticket for you to go to our concert, together with a plane ticket to London.”
They drove off to the airport hoping that they would not miss their flight. “We are not very far from the airport now,” said Paul. As they were running inside the Melbourne Airport, they heard an announcement saying that their flight to London was delayed. “Good,” said Peter, “We are very lucky that the flight was delayed, if not we might have missed our flight.” At 3:30 pm, when they boarded the plane to London.
To be continued …
Please click here for The Astolf Band, A Story By Ahmad Ali Karim (Part 5)
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