Sun, love and debauchery on the white isle

It’s a sweltering day in the West Midlands, I’ve just finished transporting numerous concrete blocks up a thirty foot ladder when I get a phone call from Aaron. “Hello?” I answered, panting down the phone, “Tom” he says, “Ibiza, September, three days, you coming?” He has a certain way of getting to the point. “um…. Maybe” I said and before I knew it, Aaron, Liam, Sam and myself were off to Ibiza. What could possibly go wrong?

The weeks roll on and it’s time to head off. I’ve got my passport, two hundred quid to spend, the shiny new camera and the extortionately expensive flip flops I’d just bought, sorted. After a plethora of drinks, we headed merrily on our way to Gatwick, ready to face Ibiza the English way, drunk.

After giddily finding our seats on the plane, Sam makes a startling revelation. “Lads”, he says, “the drinks are free!” With this in mind, we inadvertently went about destroying the last few remnants of respect that are still held for the British holidaymaker. “Excuse me” exclaimed Liam, as he hailed a member of the cabin crew, “I’ll have a bottle of your finest champizzle please stewardess.”

Apparently, the air pressure in an aeroplane is massively different to what we are usually accustomed to, due to the high altitude. This supposedly acts to double the sensation of inebriation felt by the individual. Now, if this is true, then it meant that we’d been drinking for close to eighteen hours.

I don’t actually remember landing in Ibiza, or what we did with our bags, instead my memory leads me to a small club that resembled a small swimming baths, which had been derelict for some years. I remember being confused at the time as to how I got there, I also remember that I hadn’t eaten much that night, but whatever it was that I’d consumed, It left me feeling happy enough, ecstatic you might say.

After leaving the swimming baths, all I can recall is walking solitarily beside the sea-shore, singing ‘Dock of the bay’ to myself, like some wandering vagrant from a Joyce novel. We somehow arrived at our apartments, but we couldn’t check in for another four hours. While Sam got some well-needed sleep by the pool, the rest of us did what seemed to be most logical at the time, strip down and go for a swim.

After our delightful breakfast, consisting of four large San Miguels, we set upon the long day ahead of us. Bora Bora beach; the air was salty, the view of the med was breathtaking and the people were gorgeous, perfect. However, as Aaron went missing and as Sam was unconscious back at the apartment it was left to me and Liam to have it large. Several beverages and more happy food helped us to make friends with everyone in sight. Within half an hour we were surrounded by women, I think it was at that point I realised that Liam is a genius.

Soon after, two gorgeous Irish girls joined our party and with that, Tom Reid fell in love. I can’t remember anything they said or particularly what they looked like, but I’m quite certain my feelings were genuine at the time. “Is that a Dublin accent?” I asked Ornaith (I think that was her name) and after learning I was correct, she asked me if I was Irish, I replied that I was and proceeded to wow her with my knowledge of Republican history. I knew she was impressed.

We were sitting on the sand, the waves tickling our feet when I came out with quite possibly the strangest attempt at a chat up line. “Did you know that this is the island where Odysseus was tempted by the sirens?” I said suavely. “Oh… really” she replied looking somewhat confused, to this day I’m really not sure what I was going for with that one.

As me and Ornaith continued to chat about nothing, her friend came bursting out of the sea like Ursula Andress in Dr No. She flicked her hair about, like in the loreal adverts as the water glistened off her immaculate body. I didn’t know girls like that existed in real life. “Jesus!” I blurted out unwillingly, as I continued to stare gormlessly at her flawless physique. I don’t think either of them were particularly impressed by this and somehow or other we parted ways forever...

Next thing I know, I’m in the sea with another girl, its important to point out at this stage that I wasn’t wearing clothes that were designed for swimming. I noticed Liam shouting by the edge of the sea, motioning to his pocket and then at me. I fumbled around in my pockets, only to pull out my new camera, which was now filled with sand and sea water.

Some time after falling in love and drowning my camera, I woke up alone on a sun lounger. My friends had vanished and my legs were bright red, what had happened? The only explanation to this question was the half empty bottle of absinthe that rested on my chest. I turned round to find two cockney blokes on the sun loungers next to mine, “Alright Tom” one of them said. To say that I was bewildered at this point would be a massive understatement.

After eventually finding our apartment and having the worst nap of my life, we headed on to one of Ibiza’s coolest clubs, Pacha. The club’s layout was the best I’d ever seen and the atmosphere was severely stylish, with a large emphasis placed on Faboolousness. For example, the Pacha dancers didn’t dance in the conventional sense of the word, but rather they just stood there, moving only occasionally in a constant attempt to look faboolarious.

The exertions of that day had taken their toll on me however, so instead of raving it up with Aaron and Sam, me and Liam chose to relax in the chill-out area and practice our new personas on some unsuspecting women. “Really?” one girl said impressed, “a life guard?” that one worked well, but my personal favourite was Liam’s inventive choice of vocation, a dolphin relocater.

Most of the second day was spent watching ‘Dr No’ in Spanish whilst eating a chocolate mousse without a spoon and trying to find another apartment after we were kicked out of our original abode. Needless to say I felt pretty low.

After the guys got back, we decided to go out for a well earned pint and at midnight we celebrated Liam’s birthday. “It’s my Birthday!” he yelled, as we consumed the most epic pint of our lives (he must have said it about four hundred times that day).
The final day of our holiday loomed and the plan was set: Space in the morning, use our lunch break to get some Desperados from the off license and then head back to Space to finish the holiday off before leaving for the airport at ten.

The music in Space was the best that I’d heard so far, but try as I might, I was struggling to move, let alone dance. It was then that an exquisite girl in hot pants came over to me at the bar, arms wide open as she says, “Hey Tom!”. Baffled once again I replied, “Alright…..” [Think Tom, think, what’s her name? God how could I forget meeting her? She’s gorgeous. Quick, think of something, come on, come on…nope], it just wasn’t happening. “You don’t remember me do you?” she responded, the smile gone from her gorgeous face, “No” I sighed. I learned that day that if you like a girl, being completely unaware of her existence isn’t the best way to get a rapport going.

After walking aimlessly around the club by myself for a while, knackered and dejected, my life was saved by one of man’s finest culinary achievements, ‘Snickers’. The chocolaty wonder had given me all the energy I needed to see off Ibiza in the most befitting way. So after the lunch break in which we downed some more Cervezas and after Liam and Aaron got a slap in the face from an Italian man who resembled Uncle Fester on steroids, we went back to the club to finish our holiday in style. The music was great and the company was better, it was a perfect end to a memorable holiday.

We had time for a few cheeky drinks before we had to leave for the airport and we vowed to polish off some free G and T’s on board, but we just couldn’t do it. I woke up at about half three, the plane was coming down and so were we. The holiday had been one that I’d never forget, and although I’d spent all my money and had my camera destroyed by the Mediterranean, at least I was safe in the knowledge that we couldn’t possibly have had it any larger than we did. Ibiza was well and truly, DONE.

Tom Reid, Dice Productions