I was Boris's Double

Back in the day, I was employed as a Boris Johnson look alike. It was going to be the easiest money, I ever earned or that was my plan. Easy street. I wasn’t the only one, you understand. There was a whole posse of us, though I didn’t get to meet the other guys (and three geezer-birds, by the look of them) on the first day. The organiser, some over-paid corporate twonk, didn’t want us to meet. Perhaps, he thought, we’d take over London or something. He kept it all hush, hush, strictly confidential. I met the other Borises only once, at some rinky-dink motel on the edge of London, for a photo assessment. We all had to mill about and guffaw, so the brass could grade our Borisness. Some blokes were just too fat, one bloke looked like Boris’s twin ‘cept he was black. Well very light, but you could just tell. Like those pictures when they blacked-up Senator John McCain and bleached Barack Obama. Ha, that sort of back fired coz people saw Obama like that anyway, nearly-white like them.

Still back to Project Boris, I had some fun, especially during the Olympics. We all did, I shouldn’t wonder. The pay was decent enough and of course the seats were VIP. The real Boris got stuck on a zip wire, like a human piñata. Twat, I called him. Us look-a-likes got to see a panorama of Olympic sport. Though it wasn’t all sitting about ogling girls and guys (if you’re that way inclined) in tight Lycra pants, now and again, I had to do a Boris for the cameras. One time during the girls’ taekwondo final, I was supposed to burst a crisp packet. The boss worked on the principle: all publicity was good publicity. Our handler was screaming in my ear-piece. “Just do it…burst the fucking packet, then look round and smirk, like you’re the Cheshire cat or something.”

I shifted in my seat; this really was easy money, a piece of piss.

“Hold it…the camera ’s on the girls again; cue you in, when they pan back…wait for it…wait…”  

I watched the girls. Fast AND furious, the little Chinese kept shouting like someone stole her marbles. She could kick mind you, her leg moved so fast, all we saw was the result, Welsh girl dropped like a stone, out cold for 3 or 4 seconds.

“1, 2, 3…camera with you…NOW”

“Nah.” I refused out of respect for the girls down there. They’d worked for years, sweating, kicking one another in the head. Which btw caught me by surprise, who knew taekwondo was so entertaining? Still it ain’t boxing. I lost a day’s pay over that little dispute.  But it just wasn’t dignified, I’m a Londoner.  I have my pride. And who knows Boris may have left by then or bellowed them on? Yeah, he’d bellow along with the best of us…for the Olympic ideal, pants and all.