Pinko Plush

I'd heard of it happening, of course; it's one of those things you might see in a movie, or a story you'd hear at the pub. I'd always held a faint hope that one day I might be so blessed, but, as with winning the lottery, never really believed I would.

Until today.

Today it happened to me. And all thanks for a fondness for the image of Vladimir Illych Lenin.

~~~~~~~~~
I had decided, almost on the spur of the moment, to pay a flying visit to Melbourne. Running late to board my flight at Brisbane airport, an announcement requested that I move past the restless and snaking queue to hasten my last-minute check-in. A brisk trot from the train had raised the climate inside my vinyl jacket to tropical, but in the frantic juggle of bags and slips of paper and luggage tags and identification and pens simply didn't have enough hands to remove it as I fronted up to the counter. I left it on.

As a pair of baggage handlers shuffled a trolley through the adjoining gate one of them stopped, his eye fixed on the red Lenin badge glinting cheaply on my jacket lapel. "Wow!" he said, pointing. "Where did you get that? They're really hard to come by, aren't they?" I described the market stalls of Soviet paraphernalia I'd seen in icy Berlin: great mounds of sinister flotsam, watched over by hard-faced Russians under the dour, snow-heavy skies. The conversation bobbed buoyantly on as the clerk listened, smiling, to my new friend and I share our enthusiasm for communist trinkets, and chirpy gossip about the coin-and-medal traders in the city. We both departed lively, but not before the clerk handed over my boarding pass with, "Well, since you're so nice, I've upgraded you to Business Class."

The badge had actually come from a box of dozens like it in an Elizabeth Street Army disposal, and cost $2. Two hours flying in unexpected luxury? Priceless.