I woke with a start after another night sweaty nightmares. The explosions had started earlier than usual today – around six before first light. Perhaps our side is losing the war – from the volume and the echoes around the valley, it was clear that the explosions were getting closer.
A quick check of my body reminded my brain of the pains and suffering that the enemy had visited upon it in the preceeding weeks. Static discomfort emanated from shoulders and my second favourite knee. As I raised myself from the bed, the dynamic sufferings resumed – a mangled hip-flexor, ripped triceps and a neck that refused to cover more than half it’s regular range of motion.
Stumbling around for tablets to block out the war, I set foot into camp. I noticed the transports weren’t moving, and this meant that supplies would still not be forthcoming. More than a camp, everything appeared to belong to a construction site. Bulldozers were forcing their way up snow packed paths on huge chained tyres, and monster trucks received shovels full of snow to ferry it further down the mountain, probably to sell it on the black market to parched north africans.
Explosions resound in the valleys as a continuous soundtrack to the war. Was it a war against french and Dutch skiers trying to push in front of you in the queues for lifts? Was it a race war against the so-called french? We didn’t know we just followed orders. Go up the hill on a lift. Come down the slopes on a plank. Keep your eyes peeled. Watch out for avalanches. Stay alert. We were just gravity puppets. It was an unpopular war. We had lost the support of the tax-payers back home.