The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared

Azerbaijani army. (Luckily this was before all Indonesian airlines were blacklisted by the European Union and forbidden from landing in Europe.) The company promised to arrange all the papers for the landing in Sweden, while it was the customer’s responsibility to arrange landing permission for Bali. A vet? Why?
    All that remained was the matter of payment. The price went up by twenty per cent before The Beauty with a maximum use of her rich vocabulary got the company to agree to be paid in cash in Swedish crowns on arrival in Sweden.
    As the Indonesian Boeing took off on its flight to Sweden, the friends held a council. Benny and Julius were entrusted with the falsification of some papers that they could wave in front of what they assumed would be fussy officials at LandvetterAirport, and Allan promised to arrange the Balinese landing permission.
    They had a few problems at the airport outside Gothenburg, but Benny not only had his false veterinary certificate, but also the ability to reel off some professional-sounding veterinary phrases. This, together with the certificate of ownership and the certificate of health for the elephant, and a whole bundle of credible documentation written by Allan in Indonesian, meant that they could all board as planned. Since the friends amidst the general falsification had also said that the next stop was Copenhagen, nobody asked for their passports.
     
    The travelling party included the hundred-year-old Allan Karlsson, petty thief Julius Jonsson (now declared innocent), eternal student Benny Ljungberg, his fiancée, the beautiful Gunilla Björklund, both of her pets, elephant Sonya and Alsatian dog Buster, Benny Ljungberg’s brother, the newly religious food-wholesaler Bosse, the previously so lonely Chief Inspector Aronsson from Eskilstuna, the former gangster boss Per-Gunnar Gerdin and his mother, eighty-year-old Rose-Marie, she who at one time had written an unfortunate letter to her son while he was incarcerated at the Hall Prison.
    The flight took eleven hours, without lots of unnecessary stops en route, and the group was in good condition when the Indonesian captain informed his passengers that they were now approaching Bali’s international airport and that it was time for Allan Karlsson to pull out that landing permission. Allan asked the captain to let him know when the air traffic controller at Bali got in touch. Allan would take care of the rest.
    ‘Here they are,’ said the worried captain. ‘What do I tell them? They could shoot us down any minute!’
    ‘Don’t worry,’ said Allan and took over. ‘Hello? Is that Bali Airport?’ he said in English, and received the answer that theyshould immediately identify themselves unless they wanted to face the Indonesian Air Force.
    ‘My name is Dollars,’ said Allan. ‘One Hundred Thousand Dollars.’
    The air traffic controller was completely silent. The Indonesian captain and his co-pilot looked at Allan in admiration.
    ‘At this very moment the controller and his closest colleagues are counting how many are getting a share,’ Allan explained.
    ‘I know,’ said the captain.
    Another few seconds passed, before the flightleader contacted them again.
    ‘Hello? Are you there, Mr Dollars?’
    ‘Yes, I am,’ said Allan.
    ‘Excuse me, what is your first name, Mr Dollars?’
    ‘One Hundred Thousand,’ said Allan. ‘I am Mr One Hundred Thousand Dollars, and I want permission to land at your airport.’
    ‘Excuse me, Mr Dollars. The sound is very poor. Could you please be so kind as to say your first name once more?’
    Allan explained to the captain that the controller had now started to negotiate.
    ‘I know,’ said the captain.
    ‘My first name is Two Hundred Thousand,’ said Allan. ‘Do we have your permission to land?’
    ‘One moment, Mr Dollars,’ said the flightleader, and checked with his colleagues. He then said:
    ‘You are most welcome to Bali, Mr Dollars. It will be a pleasure to have you here.’
    Allan thanked the flightleader.
    ‘This must not be your first visit,’ said the captain, and smiled.
    ‘Indonesia is the country where everything is possible,’ said Allan.
     
    When the high-ranking officials at Bali International Airport realised that several of Mr Dollars’ fellow travellers didn’t have passports, and that one of them weighed in at nearly five tons and had four legs instead of two, it cost a further 50,000 dollars to arrange the customs documents and suitable transport