All Ist Klar - Day Three

Having had a long time to think about it, I can think of no better description for the shape of Sylt (pronouned Zoolt) than a decapitated seagull, desperately trying to fly to the UK while tethered to the German/Danish border.

While Fohr may remain involved with agriculture, Sylt has long since given itself over totally to tourism. Not, however, the gaudy shit kind you find around the Mediterranean, nor the oppressive, sinister wickedness that fuels Dubai. This is good old-fashioned Victorian tourism, all parasols and beach baskets and frilly knickers and walking canes. OK, so not really but you get my point: it's traditional, seaside fun and the beach baskets – or strandekorb – are most definitely real. In fact, they're everywhere.

Today's Sylter tourist is likely to be wealthy (or at least willing to spend a large amount of cash pretending) posturing and almost certainly German. Incredibly, 96% of the people who holiday here are from the fatherland, 2% are Swiss, 1% Austrian, while the rest of the world only accounts for the other 1%. If looking for a comparison, the town falls somewhere between south coast of England seaside town and the apres-ski lifestyle in Switzerland. Other than a general lack of awareness, it's amazing that more people haven't come here – especially the sort of loud preening wanker that thrives in Dubai. Perhaps they were put off by all the Germans.
But it's not all bad. In fact, if you ignore the human factor, Sylt has a lot to offer, with enormous white-sand beaches, some genuinely remarkable geography and some incredible fresh-air.
“It is known as 'champagne air,'” says S, my guide for the day. S the Sylter was forced to retreat to her homeland from America in the early 80s because of chronic asthma problems in New York. It was a decision that broke her heart and ended her marriage, but kept her alive. Now 62, she works part time in various different jobs, including as an almost over-enthusiastic guide promoting her home town.
While I listen to her tale, though, I find myself a little distraction. My entire arm has swollen from where I was bitten two days ago into a big, shiny mess. It's hard to bend my elbow and the whole thing is throbbing like Popeye's wanking weapon. It's not a good situation.
I point this out to S, who immediately says I've been poisoned by a mosquito or wasp. I say that I've been bitten by both before, but that this has never happened. We decide to take the decision to a professional, as coincidently, our first stop is at a gigantic spa and medical facility.
Unfortunately for me, Prof. Doc. Med. T (he uses all three titles) is utterly insane. He couldn't care less about the fact I'm heading towards an amputation, he'd much rather blast me with the details of his career, which has taken him all over the world to cut people up. These days he's a plastic surgeon, but to show off his many talents, he soaks a bright yellow bandage in alcohol and wraps it on my arm. Honestly, the prick may as well have ruffled my hair and given me a wowwy pop.
We bid farewell to the Death Professor and his manic, unblinking eyes and head off to visit a much older part of Sylt's biggest town, Westerland. Had I not just come from Fohr, where the vast majority of houses have well-maintained thatched roofs, I'd probably be more impressed with all this, but it's pretty much just more of the same. I at least learn a couple of scarcely interesting factoids about the whale industry, but they're not good enough that I can be bothered recounting them now.
Kampen is next, the town where the real money is. Here, they call the Porche Cayenne, the Sylt Volkswaggon and – according to some other journalist who did a lot more research than me – it's possibly to buy a Gucci handbag here, but not a loaf of bread. That's probably a lie, but you get the idea. Mercifully, we're just here for lunch at Gosch, a seafood joint whose eponymous owner started his empire (and it caters across Germany) by selling smoked eels from a basket on the beach.
List comes next, in the northernmost part of the island. During the drive up there, though, I can't shake the feeling that all this is pretty familiar... In fact it looks a fuckload like Ayrshire – all wimpish hills and heather and gorse bushes. Very strange indeed.
Some time later, after coffee, cake and more uninteresting villages, we get back to Westerland to discover that all the pharmacies are shut on Saturday, which is wonderful. The hotel give me an icepack and suggest rubbing onion on the wound which, the internet tells me, might have been some use had I not been bitten two whole days ago, but now just makes me smell like a bin.
Arm throbbing, reeking and generally giving me cause of concern, I resolve to hit the bevvy. Tonight I am meeting Birte (Beer-tuh), the elder daughter of the Dreyers, and her boyfriend with whom she is staying on Sylt while she studies for her final medical exams in October. They are having a party before heading into town for an annual celebration for the islands’ fire fighters – with all the thatched roofs around here, they have important jobs. This is only the fourth time I'll ever have met her, but we’re more or less the same age and seem to get on pretty well – she’s the cool cousin I never had. To fuel my woeful chat, I go buy a carryout and take a nice picture of the sunset.

From there I pick up a box of amusingly named Plop! beer, so named because of the noise the stopper makes when you push it off the bottle. Four of them later, I head down to the lobby bar, have a drink with the barman and inexplicably hand him back the extra five Euros he mistakenly hands me back as change. Strange times indeed.
Anyway, by the time I turn up to the party house I am full of conversation. Amusingly, the boyfriend's big brother – if I'm told his name, I immediately forget it – is one of those northern Europeans whose grasp of English seems to involve little more than combinations of slightly old-fashioned swearing. For example, when he jams a big Havana Club and coke in my hand, he says, “Woah! Fucking hell, man!” And bounces off over to the speakers. Birte, meanwhile is relieved that I've already started drinking and makes an early apology for being half-cut herself. I talk to the strangers about football – God bless its universal usefulness – but mostly just shoot the shit with her before heading into town.
Getting into the taxi, I know I'm hammered. Rather than take any kind of precautionary measures, though, I speed up. Listen to me! I'm a funny guy! Yeah! This is great – I honestly can't believe I wasted so much money on narcotics back in the day, I mean, really I'm a fucking great, interesting guy. Listen to me and laugh you German bastards!
At one point we bump into S and I act like a stupid child trying to show off. Next we're in a club/bar thing and all I can really say is that it's busy and kind of orange and I do a lot of pushing and Birte tells me she's too drunk and I think she might puke on me but I go to the bar again anyway and order another round and go to get money out my wallet and realise there's not a cent in it and I think about running away and...