It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

This morning I did something that will make you all wince, but luckily, there was a shot at redemption.

Background: 6 hours sleep in 48.

I don’t sleep much – usually from midnight to 5 or 5:30, it’s enough.

I’ve got this personality where I’m incredibly immune to stress and worry. I can push it out of my mind quite easily. But the thing I do worry about is oversleeping. Strange, as I don’t do it.

So when I woke up yesterday at 4am, knowing I had a flight in 11 hours, I started to worry and got up.

Back to the story

Midnight last night – and it was a late midnight, we’d crossed a couple of hours’ worth of time zones – we washed up in a Kuala Lumpur transit hotel: shattered. And found a kettle, two “Lipton Gold” teabags, some slightly damp sugar sachets and some of that “creamer”.

For those of you who don’t now what “creamer” is, I envy you. Pray you never encounter it. It’s a sure sign that civilisation is in decline and the fiery pits of hell await us all. It’s the last refuge of the scoundrel; the dregs of industrialisation,the ugly face of globalisation, and clear proof that evil alien fifth columnists walk amongst us, sowing seeds of destruction.

Yes, it’s basically powdered crap that is supposed to substitute for milk. You know milk, the product of vaccimulgence, the stuff that you get from a cow, and that you can easily heat seal in individual portions that will survive 20 years? The stuff that even the worst hotel in Australia has on the shelf next to the kettle and behind the used syringe box.

So, “creamer”! That presents a problem as Lady Devotea takes milk. After decanting a small amount of boiling water, adding a sachet of the stuff and some serious whisking, and I have something I can add to tea. Not happy about it, but infinitely better tasting that just throwing the sachet in, with or without taking the paper off first.

Having constructed a farago of lies that vaguely resembled tea, I flung the use teabags into a glass and presented same. Exhausted, I was asleep moments later. For two hours.

There’s something about lying awake in an appalling motel, listening to the guy the other side of the wall trying to expel his lungs through his nose that makes one a bit mental. Over the next 4 hours until I could legitimately wake Lady Devotea at 6am, I stated to plan how I could make her a tea to start her day. I’ve done that nearly every day for the last 27 years; and two days out from our Silver Wedding Anniversary, I wasn’t about to fall over.

I couldn’t leave the room. There was one key, which would kill the power if I took it, And there were no shops nearby. I travelled without tea; I generally don’t carry tea into any country that has the death penalty for carrying marijuana, to avoid any mix-ups.

Now, I could have asked room service for more teabags. Except there was a sign saying two more would cost 3 Ringitts. That’s $1.50. I had no Ringitts. There is a $5 charge on my Visa Card for foreign transactions. I was not about to spend even a trifling amount to send the message to the world that tea bags are acceptable; even under duress. I have my principles, dammit.

I noticed that when I had flung the wretched tea bags the night before, they had caught, dangling, over the glass, and had effectively drip dried.

“Oh , NO!!”, you say, because you can see what’s coming.

Yes, with all the love, care and attention I could muster, I presented Lady Devotea with a cuppa constructed using two second-hand teabags, boiled hotel water, outrageous “creamer” and damp sugar.

I’m going to skip through showering,packing up, a bus, checking in, 5 security checkpoints and an observation on hats.

Cut to KL departure gate and she says “Harrods!”

What?

“Look”, said she: “There’s Harrods”.

Ah, blessed Assam; blessed English Breakfast mix. Blessed toast with apricot jam. Joy to the world, there’s a silver-lipped milk jug with the Harrods Logo on it!

Outgrageous prices? Don’t care.

Set combinations that seem churlish? Don’t care.

Two teas, a lovely lady who confirmed the hat observation I decided not to mention earlier in a complimentary fashion; and we are reinvigorated; alive and ready for the final leg. Thailand, here we come.