Page 20 - Demo

18Pride goes before a fall.On an Exercise in Derbyshire, we had to construct a bridge across a river using ropes and whatever we could find lying about that was useful. - which was zilch. We may have had a few staves and a rope with us. After much pratting about, we managed to construct a thing that passed for a bridge. We looked for the smallest and lightest man to be the person who would test it by crossing first. That lucky chap was Azzy Sudairy. He took one look at it, played his %u201cI am of the Royal Family of Saudi Arabia%u201d card and said %u201cNo way%u201d, setting off 50 yards downstream to where there was a plank bridge %u2013 which had been there when we arrived. Cannot remember whether he slipped or the plank broke %u2013 but he finished up off the bridge and in the water, very unhappy, whilst we, one by one, managed to get across the makeshift rope bridge without anyone falling in. Allah has a sense of humour.David ForsythIt%u2019s an Ill Wind %u2026.Bob Fuller and I had a guest on the Germany exercise, Tim (?) from Sandhurst. We were dropped off in the middle of the night, and before we started serious walking we got out a torch and (as we thought) hid its light while we looked at the map and tried to work out what to do next.Out of the darkness the well-known voice of the commander of our enemy forces startled us by suddenly informing us that we only had another half hour before we were eligible for capture, and we'd better get out of there fast! Of course eventually we were captured, and as expected, were then taken in the opposite direction from that which we were originally travelling.