KILROY WAS HERE……

Do you stamp your mug in front of famous sights, posing, with sunglasses on, with other tourists waiting on the margins, raring to go for their turn…….just you on the Bridge Of Sighs….you discovered it…. or at a famous Parisian café where you’re supposed to be watching people….but you with a faraway look in your eyes, having given barking orders to the photographer, usually your husband, that you want it to look like a candid shot? What did you say? Graffiti? No…oo.. it’s got nothing to do with those shadowy creatures that scribble their names when no one’s looking on famous walls and public buildings and toilets……in fact that’s where their careers started. No no no…of course not, you’re not defacing anything….you’re just gracing the Acropolis with your kisser, much more personal, exclusive….not everyone can afford to get their pan taken puffing up the Great Wall Of China……You just want to show the folks at home that……what? That ` Kilroy or Foo was here ‘ …oops…I mean…YOU were here.

 That brings me to, I think, the summer of 1980 when I was a student in England……gosh! how old does that make me….when my mum was visiting all the way from Malaysia and my sister and I decided to accompany her on a trip to Italy. She was excited of course, especially Italy, the seat of the Catholic faith, the pope and his blessings and all things considered holy. It was then that I had the brilliant idea……….. after reading an article that scoffed at our need to be Kilroys, stamping our grinning faces like graffiti in front of famous places…… to aspire towards a different level, to be a different breed of tourists. I convinced my sister…..I may have twisted her arm….that we’d just take photos, recording places without our mugs…. and if the folks at home should ask,` hey why aren’t you in the photos?….we’d just give them some withering looks to suggest that we’ve gone to a whole new level.  The anonymity of the non intrusive observer would set us apart from the hordes of other camera clicking tourists. So we travelled to Naples, Rome, Assisi, Florence, Venice etc…..not clicking our faces…..but recording our journey discreetly and all very civilized….. marvelling at our ability to show intellectual finesse. Oh I forgot about Mum….she tried to poke her face in front of the camera…….but no, even when she wanted to smile in front of the papal buildings in St Peter’s Square.

I need to take a deep breath before I tell you what followed……We came back to Rome the last day and they took us to a performance in a huge auditorium with loads of tourists from pretty much every part of the world, Japanese clicking away even before the show started, Americans puffing on their cigarettes……those days we didn’t care much about our health and that of others….., Australians talking loudly as if no one else was around etc. Then the lights went down and the show started…….There was this young Italian magician/ entertainer, much too handsome for his own good, who started with the usual pulling out rabbits from hats, scarves from his sleeves……then the music stopped. There was a drum roll and the spotlight searched the audience, went round and round and stopped………..and fell upon guess who? The dashing young performer walked through the aisle and between the seats with a, `mi scusi’ and a `mi scusi’ and I tried to make myself as small as possible and look the other way….but Mr mi scusi reached his hand out to me. I still get the chills and shakes when I think about it. I don’t recall how I made it to the stage……it’s all a blur…. and stood under this huge spotlight in my short mini dress. Mr mi scusi started hiding things in the hem of my dress which pulled it up even higher and as soon as I pulled it down he pulled up the other side and fished out things…. and thank God not rabbits…..and the Japanese were clicking away……

The next day one of the girls in the group came up to me and said,

` God! We could even see your blooming knickers! ‘

 That was a good lesson! Be proud….be a Kilroy, be a Foo before somebody else does it for you. I would love to hear your Kilroy experiences in the comments. Don’t let me stand on the stage like a Foo..L alone.