Cruising along

Taxi touts outside greeted me with a hopeful ‘Bula’. Mynah birds squabbled in the jacarandas and teenagers on the nearby parkland were throwing long passes with a rugby ball. Not quite your average UK betting-shop setting, but this was the Fiji branch of Grants Waterhouse. I had stepped in seeking a little inspiration for the talk I was to deliver the next day to the Cunard liner Queen Victoria’s passengers on the joys of horse-racing. (It’s a tough assignment, but somebody has to do it.) And, given Mrs Oakley’s developing taste on board for Pina Coladas and White Ladies, a little profit would have done no harm.

The heavy-duty grilles separating the staff from customers could have had a previous life housing inmates at Alcatraz and the fittings were on the economical side of sparse. Warning notices admonished patrons ‘Don’t borrow to bet. Don’t chase losses’. But with race listings from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide on the walls, there was no shortage of betting opportunities.