Maverick and Goose

During my families’ visit in February 2005, the adults had several nights out. Don’t panic we didn’t leave the kids alone…. We took it in turns babysitting. Jaki and I went clubbing, the boys went to watch the football and the girls had a night out; in our glad-rags Mum, Jaki and I headed to Madinat Jumeira for a few cocktails. Our first and as it turned out only stop, was at Trader Vics. Traders as its known has a Polynesian theme and great cocktails, and as usual was busy. We stood by the bar; well it’s the thing to do in there, though we found a stool for mum. A pleasant hour or so passed, us chatting laughing and trying cocktails. By 10.30 the place was packed, mum was getting tired and Jaki and I were enjoying trolley-dolly spotting. One thing you must understand about Dubai is it’s full of airline cabin crew; half the population here (or so it seems) works for Emirates airline in some capacity. It’s also a lay-over for many other airlines, BA included. The local Time Out magazine advertises ‘Cabin Crew Nights’ in bars; the crew show their ID and get discounted booze. So you rarely go anywhere without finding trolley-dollies as their affectionately known. After a while in Dubai, you can tell the difference between Emirates and BA crew, even in their civvies! That’s when you can truly call yourself a Dubaiean!

Anyway as I said mum was starting to fade, so we agreed to one for the road; mum turns to the bar for service, Jaki and I continue spotting. 10 minutes later we were still without our drinks, the reason why? Mum was gabbing to her neighbour at the bar. “Ey mum, where’s our drinks?” we demand. “What! These are you daughters?” the gentleman by her asks, “Of course!” answers mum. Jaki and I roll our eyes, though to be honest if you saw mum you would be surprised that she had two 30-something daughters. Introductions were made, “don’t you think he looks like Tom Cruise?” mum says, Jaki and I were thinking well erm…. No! “You know, in the white uniform”. “Oh Top Gun, you mean - Maverick and Goose” says I. “Yes!” says mum. As it turned out, mum actually meant Richard Gere in and Officer and a Gentleman, but she’d had a few cocktails. The spooky thing was, although he looked nothing like Tom Cruise, he was a real-life Maverick, a fighter-pilot with the US Navy. Before we knew what had hit us, his navigator Goose arrived as did several ‘kids’ - the trainee pilots and navigators Maverick and Goose were responsible for.

One for the road turned into several, as mum was showered with affection from the trainees; you see they’d been in the Gulf for several months, spent Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year onboard ship. They were all very homesick and really missing their mums, so they borrowed ours for the evening.

Dont have a photo of that night, so thought I'd show you the three of us in Tiger Tiger, Manchester just a few months earlier.