Maybe It Involves a Primitive Form of Teleportation

When I left for my most recent trip, I had to drive myself to the airport. I parked the car out in the long term parking lot, scoring a super sweet parking spot just a few yards from one of the shuttle stops. While waiting for the shuttle to pick me up, I noticed a poster inside the shelter, right next to the map of the parking areas.

"Overloaded with baggage? Next time, use Curbside Check-in instead!"

So, wait. Let me get this straight. Instead of hauling my luggage through the parking lot, onto the shuttle, back out of the shuttle, and up to the curbside check-in, I have the option of using a magic curbside check-in that appears right next to my car upon parking? Where do I sign up for that service? And will it also deliver the bags back to my car at the end of my trip so that I don't have to be overloaded with baggage between the baggage claim and the extended parking lot? Or am I on my own for that bit? Oh, wait! I know! It's actually a riddle. I handle your bags before they arrive in my hands. Who am I?

Running Through My Head For Some Reason

When I was in Sweden, the grocery store chain nearest to the apartment I shared with Luneray had a chain of generic personal care products. It was called "Blåvitt" ("Bluewhite") and each product was packaged in white with big blue letters labelling the product name across the front. Now, when I say "the product name", I mean that in the most literal sense possible. For example, the tube of toothpaste has big blue letters spelling out "tandkräm" ("toothpaste"), and the moisturizer is called "hudkräm" ("face cream").

When I packed for the summer, I took full sized bottles of all of my personal care products with me. My theory was that it would save me a little money, given the weak dollar* and the fact that conventional wisdom warned me that everything would be very expensive, and it would also trick me into having some space left in my luggage at the end of the trip to pack all the things I bought. Things worked pretty well-- I found myself running low on most things during my last week in Sweden, just in time to throw out the bottles in favor of packing some of the nine thousand books I'd bought. The one thing that I ran out of quickly was toothpaste. I hadn't packed a full tube for some reason-- maybe I just didn't have a full tube on hand. I did pack in something of a hurry-- and I ran out just past the halfway mark.

So I went to Konsum and bought a tube of tandkräm. And I packed the tube of tandkräm when I left for Germany... and eventually brought it all the way back to the States. There was just something about the big blue label exuberantly announcing to everyone, "Hey! There's TANDKRÄM in here!" Even after the tandkräm** was basically gone, I kept the tube in the medicine cabinet, and it made me happy to see it there.

I finally threw it out when I was packing to move in to this apartment with Ash. We were having lots of discussions about paring down our possessions at the time, and it just seemed like the right thing to do. Still, sometimes I miss seeing that little blue and white tube twice a day, every day, reminding me of the fun I had living with Luneray.


*which, wow, wouldn't it be great if we had that kind of exchange rate now?

** I bet you guys will never forget how to say toothpaste in Swedish. Maybe you can win a bar bet or something with that knowledge. Or at least you can rest assured that you'll be able to maintain proper oral hygiene should you ever end up in Sweden.

Road Rage

Man, I hate to drive. I really hate to drive. So it's unfortunate that my lovely job is nearly 30 miles each direction. The first few weeks were really bad, and I struggled to get into the swing of it. I've never really liked driving at all, not even when I first got my license. In fact, I was less than a month shy of my 19th birthday before I got around to taking the driving test, and the only reason I bothered then was that my mom was moving to a day shift job and I couldn't take the school bus for some reason (I was still in high school at 19 because I'd been gone in Germany for so long, just in case the math was throwing you off there. Try to stay focused, okay?). In college, I rented apartments very close to campus and let Finbar drive me around everywhere else except back and forth to work, really. When I lived in Buffalo, I worked something like 4 or 5 miles from home and let Finbar drive me around most of the time on the weekends. The whole time I was in law school, I rode the bus back and forth, driving only for things like going grocery shopping or to the mall, with the occasional long-distance trip to Buffalo to see Finbar, or back home to see my family. I've had my car for eight years, and before I started this job, I had only 61,000 miles on it. Because I hate to drive and try to avoid it when possible. Which makes it oh, so delicious that I've taken a job nearly 30 miles away from home.

In the grand tradition of silver linings, there's one small thing that I just love about my morning commute and it makes me super cranky when someone screws it up. I live close to the highway on ramp, which seems like it should be really convenient. However, due to the fact that crack-addled monkeys were in charge of designing the highways here in Our Fair City, actually getting to the highway is not as simple as merely cruising up the on ramp. Oh, no! The fun part is that there are three consecutive merges on the ramp itself plus one merge onto the highway. You enter about 1/4 mile before the entrance to a tunnel, which is sufficient in and of itself to cause inexplicable traffic jams at odd hours, like 7 p.m. on a Sunday night. I hypothesize that the natives here believe that a monster lives in the tunnel, or else that they think that there's a possibility that the tunnel entrance might shrink unexpectedly, much like a carnival fun ride or the door to a Bond villain's lair. Anyway, each spur of this mess of merges has a yield sign, so that once you're on the on ramp, you should be able to zip right on along while traffic entering from each of the spurs yields to you.

In the morning, that system, followed to the letter of the law would result in the traffic on the spurs being utterly unable to enter the on ramp because there would never be a break in the traffic on the main spur. As it happens, I live closest to the first, main spur. My first morning, I almost had a heart attack when I came around the corner and saw that the traffic was backed all the way along the on ramp, onto the street and back more than a block. And it didn't seem to be moving. As I sat there watching, it became clear that it was moving, just at a snail's pace. And as I approached each spur, I was pleasantly pleased to find that zipper traffic was in full effect.

Now, realize that this is not a place where people really get traffic laws or ettiquette. In fact, I am of the firm opinion that this place has some of the worst drivers in the country. I would rather drive the Beltway at rush hour than deal with Saturday afternoon traffic at the local mall. And this is a fully-informed opinion, people: I've driven the Beltway at rush hour! In my boss's car! For which I wasn't entirely certain that I was actually insured! In fact, the drivers here are so bad that the state department of transportation posted a sign near a construction site that says "Merge here. Take your turn." "Take your turn"! Like they're dealing with preschoolers fighting over a slide. So I was feeling all grateful for the fact that I start right out on the main spur, feeling sorry for the poor suckers who had to try and merge... and I was utterly flabbergasted to discover that every morning, zipper traffic is the rule. People are polite and everyone takes a turn, so the traffic moves slowly but you don't feel impatient because you know that no one is going to keep you from merging or cut you off.

Nothing ruins my morning coffee faster than the occasional oblivious jerk who doesn't get it and doesn't let people over, or muscles his way (or her way, though it's almost always a man) into the line of traffic instead of waiting his turn like the rest of us. These are, as far as I can tell, the same people who used to shove other kids off the ladder of the slide so that they could slide down without waiting their turn. Just like you, Kelly M.! Thanks for the concussion! Kindergarten wouldn't have been the same without it!

I am also constantly astounded by the new heights to which drivers in this city take rubbernecking. I can sort of understand the impulse to look, the train wreck phenomenon. But. People! There are fenderbenders almost every single day. And most of the time, all there is to see are two cars pulled over in the emergency lane with little or no visible damage. So there is no need to do more than just notice it as you drive by at a reasonable speed. There is no need to, say, come to a COMPLETE STOP to try and get a good gawk at the fender bender in the opposite lanes, especially when there is a great, hulking concrete barrier blocking most of your view anyway! You don't get to see anything "worth" seeing, and you are causing a traffic jam several miles long. I kid you not, people were coming to a dead stop, and you would see their heads turn and their necks stretch, then they would realize that they could see nothing and hit the gas, resuming normal speeds. This particular instance of nonsense made my 45 minute commute stretch to 1 hour and 35 minutes the other day. I wasn't sure whether I wanted more to cry or scream.

God forbid that a few snowflakes fall.

Epic Journey-- The Conclusion

The desk clerk at the hotel wanted a deposit from me. I started to cry. Why would you want a deposit? Here’s my room voucher. I can’t possibly skip out on paying your bill—because I’m not *paying* your bill. Oh, for Pay-Per-View. Well, turn it off in my room! Finally I got the key to a room on the 7th floor. Up in the tiny elevator (I barely fit with all of my luggage) and down the hall to the room. Mind you, there’s no luggage cart to help me out here, so I’m balancing all four pieces of luggage. And did I mention that I was tired? I struggled through the door, dropping the luggage just inside the room, and headed for the telephone to try and call Finbar before he left for the airport to pick me up from the flight that I hadn’t made. I picked up the receiver—no dial tone. Dialed 9 – no dial tone. Screw this, I’m going to call the front desk for help. Nothing happens. Awwww, crap. The phone must be broken. Awwwwwwwwww crap! That means I have to go back downstairs.

The front desk clerk was great. She was so patient with me, even though I practically in tears again. So close to bed and yet so very far away! I would need to move to another room (otherwise I couldn’t just not call out, I also couldn’t get a wake up call in the morning). Now, in the light of day and weeks later after an uninterrupted streak of not staying awake for 4o some-odd hours, I realize that this is perfectly reasonable. At the time, I remember being happy about the fact that she had a way to fix the problem but at the same time feeling like there was no possible way that I was going to be able to move all that stuff again. Heaven help me, I was so completely wrung out that I seriously couldn’t imagine how I would manage to drag my suitcases down the hallway to a different room. I guess the (wonderful, amazing) desk clerk must have read that thought in my face because she very kindly said, “You know what, let me just come up and help you get settled”. Which she did—absolutely above and beyond the call of duty for a desk clerk at a Sleep Inn.

Finally ensconced in my room-with-a-working-phone, I was able to call Finbar and let him know about the change of plans. I must not have been very coherent because he eventually interrupted me to say “Why don’t you tell me about it when I pick you up at the Buffalo Airport tomorrow? Get some sleep so that you won’t miss your flight. I’ll be waiting for you out front.” Wonderful man, he is.

Having taken care of that urgent situation, it was time to look to the care and feeding of my poor exhausted body. Hmmmmmm, $25 meal voucher for the hotel restaurant... let’s see what’s what. Turns out the restaurant isn’t actually part of the hotel, it’s next-door. And there’s no footpath. So I had to walk down the long, dark hotel driveway and then back up the driveway to the restaurant. Fun, fun, fun. The place turns out to be one of those “been there forever” restaurants that haven’t changed since the 1960’s. Heavy wood paneling, lots of gilded mirrors, older women waitressing, and a menu full of things like “Open Faced Roast Beef Sandwich (served with Mashed Potatoes)” and “Tuna Melt (served with potato salad”). By now, I suppose it was 11:15 or so. I had seen a sign on the hotel lobby wall that noted the restaurant hours as “Until 1 am”, so I wasn’t worried about getting served. So I was a little disappointed to find that “Night Menu” was the only food being served. And the night menu was nothing but lunch meat sandwiches on white bread for the most part. I ended up ordering something like a chef salad and a roast beef sandwich and a bottle of water. Not a thrilling meal, but at least it was something. And you shouldn’t look a gift (voucher) horse in the mouth, I suppose. The bartender invited me to wait at the bar while my food was being prepared.

I sat on a stool and leaned against the bar. I’m sure I looked like the worst kind of drunk with my dirty, wrinkled clothes, glazed eyes, and disheveled hair. The bar was full of Navy guys and the macho was so thick you could cut it with a knife. Consequently, the bar was also full of Those Women. On the stools next to me were a prime example of this coupling. The guy was tall and tattooed, wearing a super tight black T-shirt and jeans with ostentatious cowboy boots. He was aggressive and chugging Bud Light like it was going out of style. Leaning in toward him and attempting to make cow eyes was That Woman—frizzed out spiral perm, loooots of black eyeliner, a tiny little tight white dress with a gold lamé belt and strappy, pointy sandals with spike heels at least three inches high (how can she possibly walk? And how did she get up on the barstool without giving us all a glance of her underwear (presuming that she was wearing any—a dangerous presumption, as far as I can tell)). And the second the guy glanced over in my direction (and it truly was nothing more than a glance. I’m not trying to puff up my own power of attraction here.), she immediately gave me The World’s Dirtiest Look and placed her hand possessively on his arm. I was amused—macho military is not exactly my type and I wouldn’t pick up a guy in this sleazy little restaurant for all the tea in China. Thankfully, my food came fairly quickly. I paid and slid off the barstool, which prompted Macho Navy Guy to yell (too drunk to regulate his voice) “You’re not leaving, are you?”. Which royally pissed That Woman off. “Stay here and drink with us”. I gave a false little laugh and told him that I was too tired for drinking tonight. He tried to block my way, but I ducked around a waitress with a cocktail tray full of drinks and booked it out the door.

Back upstairs, I spread out the “feast” on the bed (and I’m not trying to be derogatory here—to be honest, typing this is making me hungry) and flipped on the local news. After nearly two months, it was the first time I had the chance to listen to an English newscast. Then I decided that I was just too dirty to sleep, so I dug out the little hotel soaps and took a quick (but very hot) shower. Then I collapsed into bed. And couldn’t fall asleep. It was just ridiculous. All this time, I’d been looking forward to this very moment. I had been awake for 46 hours or so. I needed to be up in about 6 hours to catch the shuttle back to the airport. Why, my treacherous body, do you betray me like this?

I suppose I must have dropped off at some point because the wake-up call did exactly that. Now, there is nothing interesting about my preparations in the morning, so I’ll spare you that. I totally ravaged the free breakfast buffet and then caught the shuttle to the airport—thankfully a different shuttle with a functioning door that didn’t flop open on the highway. I made it through the check-in at the AirTran counter with no problems (and I’d like to take a moment to reiterate how pleased I was with AirTran—their customer service was great) , was relieved of my heavy luggage (with no guff from the desk clerk about paying any extra fees) and even had enough time to track down a coffee bar in the airport. I was feeling pretty good... until I got to security.

It wasn’t so much that I was worried about time. I had more than two hours until departure. The set up of the security area was a little confusing and I paused to get my bearings. The security worker in that area immediately started screeching at me to “Go to the end of the line! No cutting in line!” Jeez Louise, Lady! That’s what I’m trying to do! But I CAN’T SEE ANY STUPID END OF ANY LINE! I guess I didn’t move fast enough because she ran over to me and screeched some more about the end of the line—which turned out to be down a long hallway and around the corner. I’ve never seen a security line this long in all the flying I’ve done. Whatever, I’ve got time and you can’t change it anyway. I sipped my coffee and inched along toward the security lanes. Just before reaching the front of the line, it occurred to me that I might have a plastic knife (from the breakfast buffet at the hotel) in my bag somewhere. I took it to spread cream cheese on my bagel while I was waiting outside the hotel for the shuttle pick-up and wasn’t entirely certain that I’d thrown it away. Cue a frantic search of my carry-on bags, fueled by the mental image of me calling Finbar to let him know that I had been arrested for terrorism and the follow-up image of my poor parents seeing me on the evening news (“An incident at Baltimore International Airport closed the terminal this morning...). Can you imagine? And in a couple of years when I try to be admitted to the bar, I’ll be faced with the task of explaining to the character committee why I tried to hijack a plane. Good Lord, where the heck is that knife? Finally, I found it—in my back pocket (even better! Now it really looks like I’m trying to smuggle on a weapon!). Now the security worker refused to let me out of line. I wasn’t sure if I should tell her why I was trying to leave the line (would I get arrested for “Threatening a Security Agent”? This woman certainly seemed loony enough to construe it that way) or if I should just hand the knife to the guy at the checkpoint or what. The guy next to me called his wife over and she laughed, but agreed to throw the knife out for me.

I passed through the metal detector with no particular problems. Then it was on to the x-ray belts, where everyone was required to take off their shoes and jackets. That was the first time I was required to remove my shoes for security. I wasn’t particularly happy about it, since I was wearing Birks with no socks and it meant putting my bare feet on the nasty airport floor, ewwwwwww. While my bags and accoutrement were being scanned in the machine, I was directed to one of eight or so folding tables lined up around the walls. Each table had a series of plastic bins on it, a plastic chair sitting to the side of it, and a small mat in front of it, similar in nature to a doormat, except that it had a pair of footprints printed on it. A very young looking TSA agent with crazy cool short dreads was at “my” table. He had me sit on the chair while he retrieved my bags from the machines and then identify each bag. Once everything had been reclaimed and placed in one of the plastic bins, he put on latex gloves and started going through the contents of the bags. This is the first time since 9-11 that I’ve been chosen for one of these “random” searches (although, as I looked around, I saw that everyone was being searched in a similar manner, so that wasn’t very random) and I have to say that I had dreaded this very thing, not because I was trying to smuggle some sort of contraband in my carry-on baggage, but because it just seems so incredibly invasive. But the young man searching my luggage was very polite to me, and very careful and respectful in his handling of my belongings. He made some small jokes with me about the weather and the hassles of traveling—it was altogether a pleasant experience, which is kind of surreal, considering the invasion of privacy involved.

Anyway, as I’m sure Lune (and Dani) can testify, my bags were packed tightly. I am the master of packing—I can get more stuff in a suitcase than anyone I know, and it all gets there in one piece. I’ve traveled with everything from bottles of wine to hand-blown stained glass balls and never yet had anything break in transit. My carry-ons are no exception. The poor TSA agent had disturbed the careful arrangement, despite his gentle handling of the contents of the bags, and now he couldn’t get it all back in. Finally, I asked him if I could be permitted to repack the bags. He radioed a supervisor, who came over and agreed to let me repack after a scan and a pat down. So, I stood on the footprint mat, held my arms out “like you’re flying”, and let a female supervisor pat me down like the badguy on Law and Order. Then I carefully realigned everything in the carry-on and easily closed the lid on the rolly bag, much to the amazed amusement of the TSA agent and his supervisor watching the process. Maybe I should send a letter to David Letterman and see if he wants to broadcast this Stupid Human Trick?

The AirTran flights were good. They boarded on time, the flight crew was friendly, and the flights didn’t involve any narcotic overdoses, so that’s an improvement right there. I was proselytized to by one of the people sitting in my row, not to join the Jehovah’s Witnesses, but to convert to some new-agey philosophy involving visualization mixed with a healthy dose of “Christianity”. I think my favorite part of the guy’s “testimony” was when he told me that he couldn’t believe what a “godd*mned” difference Jesus Christ and visualization had made in his life. Later, he grabbed my copy of Der Spiegel out of my hands and pointed to a picture of a beautiful young girl, announcing that he simply could not believe the resemblance between the woman sitting between the two of us and this girl in the magazine. The woman, who must have been in her forties, looked at me and rolled her eyes. He simply could not let it go and started showing the magazine to the people in the rows around us. I wished with all of my heart that I’d never let on that I could speak English at all.

And then the plane touched down in Buffalo, I met Finbar in the check-in area, we claimed my luggage (and I was furious to discover that the handle on my brand new red suitcase had been ripped off) and that’s the end of my epic journey. I was sad to leave Germany and Dani, but it was good to be home.

Epic Journey, Part 3

The rest of the flight passed uneventfully. I didn’t sleep of course, partially because the mid-afternoon take-off meant that the skies stayed perfectly light the entire time, partially because I have trouble sleeping on a plane anyway, and in large part because of the upset caused by the medical emergency happening two rows behind me. We landed in Baltimore about 30 minutes behind schedule. I thought I might still make it, as long as I had very good luck getting my baggage and clearing customs. My passport and green customs form was at the ready. My carry-on was re-packed and under the seat to allow the quickest possible exit from the plane (although the fact that I was at the back of the plane somewhat negated that advantage).

But the plane taxied to the end of the runway and just... stopped. We waited at the end of the runway and at first I thought that we were just waiting for our turn to go to the gate. Then I saw the flashing lights of a string of ambulances and police cars. They pulled up to the plane and numerous EMS workers came on. They took the man off the plane and the emergency vehicles all sped away. Once they were cleared, we were able to mosey on over to the gate and deplane.

In the meantime, I had started chatting with the people sitting around me. It turned out that the person sitting directly in front of me lives just outside of Rushville, IN (hi, Suzanne!) and their daughter is applying to Our University for medical school. Die Welt ist ein Dorf... And of course, I shared my dilemma of the short time frame to clear customs and get to my next flight. There was much sympathetic clucking and jokes about bribing customs officials and elbowing senior citizens out of the way. I was torn between a philosophical resignation to overnighting there in Baltimore and the urge to cry hysterically at the idea of overnighting there in Baltimore.

Once we got out of the plane and into the terminal, I took off as fast as my little paws would carry me, dragging the rolly bag behind me. I came skidding up to the customs lanes, ready to whip out Ol’ Blue, slap the green customs form across the desk, assure the agent that I was not smuggling anything untoward in my luggage, get my entry stamp, and run. But noooooo. The lines were already quite long (how did those people get there ahead of me? I was really booking it!) and I figured that just waiting my turn was going to take all the time I had (about 40 or 45 minutes). But yet again, an angel intervened: the man who had been sitting in front of me jogged up to the front of the line and came back with the message that I could go to the head of the line. Wow!

So I slid on up to the counter, whipped out Ol’ Blue, slapped down my green customs form and smiled my best smile, ready to answer the usual questions: any cigarettes? No. Alcohol? Yes, exactly 1 liter of schnapps. Agricultural products? Nope. Currency over $10,000. Heh, I wish, but no. And Pete behind the desk slooooooowly flipped open Ol’ Blue and looked over the numerous stamps I had accumulated this summer. He scrutinized the page as though I might have spent hours perfecting the state seal of Estonia to make it look like I’d spent 6 hours there when really I was hanging out in Pakistan with Osama. Then he carefully examined my green customs form. The smile on my face grew a little stiff. Then he lazily asked me where I’d been (Dude, you just read the entry and exit visas in the passport AND the question on the green customs form that asked for the same information!), how long I’d been there (again... YOU JUST READ IT), why I was there (OK, that you couldn’t have read. But really, if I was off training with Al Qaeda, do you really think I’d tell you that? It’s like those old questions about who packed your suitcase and whether you’re carrying any explosives!), what I was bringing back with me (books, books, books, some schnapps, a bunch of magazines from Frankfurt Airport, and a vague distaste for Swedes, plus a lot of dirty laundry), how much of it I was bringing (READ THE CUSTOMS FORM! READ IT!)... He finally handed me my passport back and dismissed me with a wave. No thank you or have a nice day. Just a dismissive little waive, as though he was the King of U.S. Customs dismissing a peasant wench.

Whatever, there wasn’t time to worry about it. I fixed my sight on “Baggage Claim (International)” and started down the hall. But I only got about 20 or 30 yards before I was stopped by another customs agent who wanted to see my passport and green form and ask all the stupid questions again. YOU PEOPLE ARE WASTING MY TIME! I made it to the end of the hallway and was stopped again to show my passport, my green customs form, and to answer the stupid questions. Then I was finally allowed to enter the baggage claim area.

No baggage in the carousels. Greeeeeeeat. I was one of the first five people there. Other people had let me cut to the front of the line to speed me on my way. I ran all the way down the hall. And it was all for nothing because THERE WAS NO BAGGAGE ON THE CAROUSEL. I positioned myself directly in front of the chute so that I could grab the luggage at the first possible second. I could still make it! Eye of the Tiger! And the other people from my flight came trickling into the luggage area. But still no luggage. We waited and waited and finally, finally! the belt started. Luggage started to come in dribs and drabs, but not mine. I kept glancing down at my watch, my stomach growing tighter and tighter as the minutes ticked by. An airline employee wandered by and I grabbed her to ask that she check to see if my flight might be delayed (after all, no sense in worrying if that’s the case), but she refused. That kind of took me aback. Would it really have been difficult to radio to the desk or the gate and ask what the status of the flight is? They do it all the time on Airline. The baggage claim was starting to empty of passengers and there was still no sign of my bags. Greeeeeeat. Not only am I going to miss my flight, I am also going to end up with no luggage. RRRRRRRR! Another woman with an employee ID wandered by and I asked her to check on my flight. She didn’t radio anyone, but said “Oh, honey, that flight left 10 minutes ago”. What? That’s early! She must be kidding. Well, maybe I can get rebooked on another airline or something. If my luggage ever comes. Suddenly I wanted to lay down and start blubbering “I just want to go hoooooooome!”.

And then, finally, after more than 45 minutes of waiting, the first of the two bags tumbled down the ramp. And then, the last piece of luggage on my flight turned out to be mine. Looks like my streak of luck had run out. Well, OK. Off to Icelandair to get rebooked. At the far side of the room, there was a large arrow pointing to the exit. And under that arrow, I was asked for my passport and green customs form again. Seriously people! Does Homeland Security have too much budget and not enough real work? Then I rounded the corner and found another line for customs. Luckily for my sanity, that was the last one. They actually collected the green customs forms and let us out into the terminal with all the other people who were not stupid enough to travel internationally post-September 11th. Now, don’t get me wrong. I agree that ingress into the U.S. should proceed under the restrictions of our law and that the enforcement of those laws is an important job. But how on earth did five different people asking me for my passport and customs forms and wanting to know where I’d been and what I was bringing with me make this country any safer? Only one of those people actually entered my information into a computer. The other ones just looked at the papers. And how on earth are you going to know if I’m lying about why I was in Finland? And why on Earth did I have to fill out the green customs form???? In the instructions, they tell you that it’s to expedite the customs process. But I can’t see how it expedites anything except the destruction of virgin forests to supply the paper for the stupid things. If you’re going to require me to write it down, why have the agent ask me the same questions? The common sense way of doing it would be for the agent to read the answers and ask any necessary follow-up questions based on those answers.

Anyway, I shoved the very heavy luggage cart up the ramps to the third floor and the Icelandair ticket counter where I was now second in line. Icelandair would pay to put us up in hotels that night and give us meal vouchers, since it was now long past 9 pm and no other flights were leaving. I was called up to the desk and the girl started filling out the paperwork. While we were waiting for the meal vouchers to be brought up from the office, she started chatting with me.

“I’d be so mad about this if I were you.”

“Well, I would much rather be on my way home right now, but if someone’s that sick, what are you going to do?” (Obviously my philosophical side had returned.)

“Oh, but he wasn’t sick. He overdosed.”

WHAT?? It turned out that our “poor” heart attack victim had taken an entire bottle of Valium somewhere over Greenland. My sympathy vanished immediately. It also turned out that he was travelling with two women who couldn’t speak English, or for that matter, Icelandic. So they had no idea what was happening to him and couldn’t even communicate with the people around them. How inconsiderate! My sympathy level slipped even further into negative numbers.

Icelandair was phenomenal about this. There was no arguing that this was a circumstance beyond their control, no chintziness about meal vouchers, no one made us feel like we were ungrateful wretches imposing upon the good nature of the airline. Instead, they apologized to us, put all of us up in hotel rooms (I could hear the supervisor in the office trying to drum up more spots), and gave us $25 meal vouchers. Then they called the hotels and asked if they could send the shuttle drivers a little more often for the immediate future because there were so many of us that would need a pick up.

Then I had to go to AirTran to rebook my flight to Our Fair City. There was some confusion as to what I was talking about when I first got to the counter and I was, quite frankly, so tired that I could hardly even think, let alone try to straighten someone else’s confusion out. Luckily, another employee noticed the problem and came over to help. Unluckily, there were no flights to Our Fair City with open seats. Not that night, not the next day, not even the day after that. The next available flight was Monday morning. I did not know what to do. Could they even do this? Aren’t they required to put me on the next available flight? They wanted to send me back to Icelandair. I didn’t want to go. By this point, it is 9:30 on Friday night. I have been awake since about 2 a.m. Thursday (as in overnight from Wednesday). That means that I’ve been awake for about 43 ½ hours straight. I cannot make decisions or do anything that requires more thought than my brain stem can handle on its own. Please just help me! I kept babbling about needing to arrive in Our Fair City early enough to drive to Buffalo (no wonder they were confused, right?) and finally it hit me: why not fly to Buffalo? Oh, Lord, yes, AirTran does, in fact, fly to Buffalo. Woo hoo! And there’s a flight tomorrow morning. Woo hoo! And, glory be, there’s a seat available! WOO HOO! Money!

I headed for the front of the airport to catch a shuttle and collapsed gratefully on a bench under the sign that said “Hotel Shuttles”. And waited. And after more than 30 minutes in the dark (lighting is not BWI’s strong point), I was starting to get worried. I went inside to the courtesy phones and called the hotel. The desk attendant assured me that the driver would be there any minute. So I trudged back about and sat at the curb for another 20 minutes. And I called again. At 10:30 p.m., the driver finally drove up to the curb. He helped me on board with my baggage (all 130 pounds of it). I plopped down in the first seat on the passenger side of the bus. A few other passengers got on board, then the driver slipped behind the wheel and we took off into the rainy Baltimore night. I thought I was crazy at first. But there was a definite draft in the bus. All the windows were shut, though. Wonder where it’s coming from? At the red light, the driver put the bus into park and stood up, reached across the dash and pulled the door shut. We’ve been riding with the door partially open. How could he forget to close the door? The light turned and we headed onward—and it became abundantly clear that he hadn’t forgotten. The door was apparently broken. It slid open almost as soon as we took off again. The driver pulled over three more times before he finally gave up and just let it flap open. I wished with all of my heart that I had not chosed to sit in that front seat and tightened my grip on the straps of my backpack and the rolly bag.

Epic Journey, Part 1

Just for my girls in Europe (ETA: and Seattle), here’s the full story of my epic journey home.

First, some technical information: all times are EDT, even for the parts of the story that take place in Europe. This is intended to keep the timeline clear.

The story really begins two days before my departure for the States. I was visiting Dani and Claus. On Wednesday, the heat was unbearable and I had a great deal of difficulty falling asleep in the unairconditioned apartment. In the end, I probably slept only three or four hours. Thursday, being my last day in Germany, was a whirlwind of visiting with friends who I hadn’t seen in four years and may not see again for a very long time. I ended up staying awake more or less all night talking and finishing my packing, save for a short catnap around 10 pm (4 am Friday morning in Germany). We left for the train station at 11:30 pm, and I left on the train to Frankfurt shortly after midnight (6 am Friday in Germany).

The first leg of the journey was a small commuter train that travels between Regensburg and Munich, stopping at all but the smallest villages. No first class section, but that’s no big deal. This was a double decker, though which meant lugging the luggage up and down steps no matter where you sit. I couldn’t squeeze my luggage down the narrow aisle without seriously (and understandably) annoying the commuters. So I left the two bags in the vestibule area and took a seat on the aisle near the staircase. This did not last long.

(TIME OUT—one of my esteemed classmates just used the word “validivity”. Help me.)

Back to the story. The arrangement of seating and luggage was not working out for me because I could not see the luggage and was therefore forced to jump up every time the train stopped at a station to make certain that my luggage didn’t take an unscheduled and unaccompanied trip into the Bavarian countryside. And the closer we got to Munich, the curvier the route got, so that eventually I had to get up and hold my luggage to keep it from flying around. But it’s not like I haven’t traveled in the SRO parts of trains before, so that wasn’t a big fat hairy deal. However, I somehow managed to pick the one train car in all of Germany that still has a smoking section—namely, the top deck of the car, which has no doors separating it from the stairwell, so the smoke can qualm unabated into the ostensibly non-smoking part of the train. It wasn’t so bad at first. But as we got closer to Munich, more and more people started lighting up, presumably to cram that last cigarette in before the start of a non-smoking working day. All train stations and subways in Munich are non-smoking, as are many (perhaps all) workplaces, so that might very well be the last chance to smoke for hours. The cloud of carcinogens grew thicker and thicker, and unlike the older trains, this nice, new double decker train does not have windows that open. I was dying by the time we arrived.

The next leg of the journey was a four hour trip in the high-speed ICE train. This train is nice, even in second class, with comfy seats, a restaurant car, smooth riding, and generally clean facilities. It’s much nicer than flying, if you ask me. But I wasn’t riding 2nd class—the Eurail pass for anyone over 26 only comes in 1st class. So I was riding in style. I had a reserved seat, which turned out to be in a compartment. The seats were leather, there was a table with electrical outlets for laptops, and the door shut out most noise from the rest of the train. Luxury.

My compartment was already occupied by two middle-aged men in suits. I figured that meant a quiet ride with them absorbed in the morning paper or reports or whatnot and me happily reading Harry Potter und der Fenixorden (or whatever the proper German title is—quite frankly, I am too lazy to look it up) and eating poppyseed pastries. Boy, was I wrong. If Finbar were a middle-aged German business man, these men would be Finbar. From the moment I walked through the door of the compartment, they were joking with each other and me, telling stories, and talking (as they say in German) about God and the world. Before they got off the train in Mannheim, we had talked about everything from the style of watch favored by Americans to linguistic difficulties in international business settings, to how cultural differences are reflected in languages, to (god help us all) George W. Bush. Nice guys, very funny. And unlike many Europeans, they were willing to listen to me when I tried to point out how their stereotypes of Americans were inaccurate. (Except for the watches. They were and probably remain to this day convinced that all Americans wear large plastic digital watches. Mine is small and silver because I’m “not a typical American”). I really enjoyed the trip, which is good, because that warm glow is probably all that kept me from going postal at the Frankfurt Airport.

The train stops in a terminal attached to the airport. It’s all brand-spanking new and totally different from my last trip through Frankfurt four years ago. The signage, however, is abysmal, especially considering the number of non-German speaking Americans (and others) pass through this airport either as members of the military (and their families) or as tourists. When I say that the signage is abysmal, I don’t just mean “Oh, the signs weren’t in English”, I mean there were almost *no* signs in any language telling you how to get to the various terminals. I managed to piece the path together, and it could not have been more convoluted if it had been designed by a maze-builder. There were lots of steps involved: you go up two floors, then down one, then up one, then down three, and so on. And I would bet you that I walked at least three miles. I wasn’t too fussed just yet, because it was only about 5 am (Friday) and my flight didn’t leave until 8 am. But did I see a single luggage cart? No, I did not. But the final kicker was that the last set of escalators was broken. I wanted to cry. In fact, I wasn’t sure exactly how to wrestle my two rolly bags and two backpacks (one normal sized, one giant-hiking-the-Appalachian-Trail sized) down all three narrow flights of escalator-stairs. I took a deep breath and started the agonizing trip down one stair at a time. Great burly German men were pushing past me without even a glance in my direction. By the time that I got to the landing between the 1st and 2nd flights, I was *soaked* in sweat and my arms and legs were screaming. I was also thisclose to tears. I started the 2nd flight, but could not make it to the next landing, seized by a cramp in my side. I was standing on one step, holding my side, gasping in pain, using my body to wedge my rolly bags against the stair above me to prevent them from rolling past me and tumbling uncontrolled down the stairs, bowling over old-lady tourists and small children clutching their teddies. And did any of the big, strong men passing me by stop to ask if I was OK or if I needed help? No, they did not. CURSE YOU!

A few minutes later, I felt able to go on and started my torturous journey again. And like Cosette, my load was unexpectedly lightened by a sympathetic angel. But instead of a French ex-convict on a mission of mercy, my angels were two tiny women dressed in saris. Neither of them spoke German or more than pidgin English. Each of them grabbed one of my bags and lugged it to the bottom of the stairwell, where they waited for me to catch up and then waved goodbye with smiles as I thanked them profusely. I hope, wherever they are, that someone shows them the same great kindness that they showed me.

After all of this, I was extraordinarily dismayed to find out that I was nowhere near my goal (check-in at the international terminal, for those that have lost track of the thread of the story). I still had to take a shuttle bus to the appropriate terminal. I slogged up to the bus stop just as the bus pulled away. But hey, no problem, there’s another bus sitting a few yards behind it. I walked toward the second bus, only to see the doors whisk shut and the driver pull away from the curb. But wait! There are no people on that bus! What’s going on? The bus drove maybe 50 yards forward and stopped. The doors opened. I moved forward and boarded. I did not want to try to maneuver my luggage into the narrow aisles, and there were no luggage racks or anything, so I boarded at the rear door and moved up against the windows with my luggage, prepared to stand for the duration of the trip. But no, the driver had different ideas. He came stomping down the aisle, yelling at me in a thick Turkish accent that I had to get out of the aisle because “Other people besides you want to ride the bus”. I tried to explain about the whole heavy suitcases thing, but he just kept yelling, and finally, he picked up my big suitcase and heaved it up into a set of seats and told me to put my carry-on on top of the suitcase. So, instead of taking up just enough room to stand against the wall of the bus with my suitcases immediately in front of me (touching my legs, no less), I ended up taking up *four* seats—one for me, one mostly blocked by my hiking backpack, and two taken up by the big suitcase. But, you know, other people besides me wanted to ride the bus.

By this time, it was about 5:30 or so. Still no problem with time. Except that the bus just sat there. People had gotten on and the bus was fairly full—no empty seats that I could see, but still room to stand. So we continued to sit there. In a bus full of people. With windows that could not be opened. In the sun. Did I mention that Germany was in the middle of a heat wave? The passengers started to get mutinous. An elderly British woman started yelling in a clear, perfect German that this was ridiculous treatment of passengers, that her dogs were treated better than this, that the driver was a barbarian. A gigantically fat man started yelling up to the front of the bus, “My children can’t stand this much longer. Is this bus planning to leave anytime soon?” And the whole time, the driver sat, blissfully ignoring us, talking on his cell phone and fixing his hair in the side mirror (his window was open). After more than a half-hour, we finally took off. Tires squealing, we pulled up to the terminal and the passengers spilled out of the doors. And there I sat, unable to move until the entire bus emptied so that I could start prying the luggage out of the seat, into the aisle, and out the door. Did Mr. Bus Driver come back to help? No, he was fixing his hair again. I was finally reduced to a screaming fit along the lines of “You made this mess, you clean it up!”. He grudgingly slogged down the aisle and pulled my luggage out for me.

Having finally made it to the international terminal, I was now starting to worry slightly about the time. It was about 6:15, and Icelandair requests that passengers for international flights check in two hours before departure. I was now at slightly less than that. I was thrilled to find luggage carts in large numbers, and finally unstrapped the heavy hiking pack. Thus unburdened, I shoved off for the check-in counters. Of course the Icelandair counter was all the way at the opposite end of the terminal. *sigh* I wended my way through the throngs at United and Delta and my heart soared when the blue and gold Icelandair logo came into sight. But the problem was that there didn’t seem to be any actual lines, just a huge crowd of people milling around with carts full of luggage and a whole line of counters for small airlines. Not wanting to get into the wrong line or cut in line or something, I flagged down one of the red-blazered airport staff and asked her where the line for Icelandair check-in was. She pointed to a place, I thanked her, and rolled my cart there. And stood and stood and stood, while every line but the one I was in started moving. A woman and her daughter who were just in front of me asked the same woman what was going on and came back with the answer that Icelandair check-in was moving to the Acme Air counter and we would have to get into that line. So we moved over and joined what might be the single largest line of passengers I have ever seen. And I’ve flown on Christmas several times. Anyway, we were snaking slowly but inexorably toward the front of the line and suddenly I noticed that the other passengers all had Acme Air tags on their luggage. The feeling of unease grew as I finally got far enough forward to see that there were people in Icelandair uniforms at the Icelandair counter and that they were checking people in. I started looking around for Red Blazer Lady. But she was nowhere to be found. I wasn’t sure what to do.

By now it was 7 am, and I was really worried because the lines were long and I hadn’t gone through security yet. I thought that I was really playing things safe by arriving at the airport three hours before departure. What on earth was going on? Red Blazer Lady came into view, but she was studiously avoiding eye contact with the waiting line of passengers. Eventually, I just couldn’t stand it anymore. I swung my stuff out of line and made my way over to her. She oh-so-casually started to wander away, so I had to yell after her “Hey! Which one of these lines is supposed to be for Icelandair check-in? That one or that one?” She turned and oh-so-disdainfully points to the original line I was in. I wanted to explode. “Are you sure? Because you also said that that line was for Icelandair. I don’t have time for another mistake.” She started denying that she said any such thing, yada yada, and eventually I had to interrupt. She insisted that the original line was the correct one, so I headed over and joined the end of the line, fuming. It was hot, I was tired (been awake for most of the last 48 hours by that point), I was worried that I would miss my flight, I was hungry, and I had to pee. And this was the slooooowest check-in line ever. Ever.

Cut to the point where I finally get to the front of the line. The gent behind the counter saw my blue passport and immediately addressed me in English. This is one of my biggest pet peeves. Don’t assume that just because I’m American I can’t speak any language but English! Now, in fairness, I understand that most people are just trying to be friendly and don’t intend to condescend. That’s why, despite my annoyance, I’m never nasty to people, I just reply in German, “I can speak German” in as friendly a manner as possible. Most people smile back and switch to German, everyone’s happy. Not this guy. He responded in English, “That’s OK, you don’t need to worry about it. I can just speak English.” RRRRRRRRR! That’s just flat out rude. I’m not worried about speaking German. If I was, I would just have accepted your original unspoken offer to speak English. Furthermore, if I want to conduct the transaction taking place in Germany in German I don’t think I’m being unreasonable. It’s the language spoken in that country! It’s even the official language! And don’t condescend to me!

I repeated my standard sentence in a much less friendly manner.

He switched to German.

Now, here’s the part of the story that I know Dani and Claus are most looking forward to: when I heaved my bags on the conveyor belt, the total combined weight was 58 kg. Yes, that’s right, fifty-eight. My sigh of relief at not needing to pay the excess baggage charge could be heard in Siberia and is probably responsible for Hurricanes Frances and Ivan, thanks to the butterfly effect. Sorry, Florida.

Anyway, this is when I found out that the flight was delayed until 9:30 a.m. Well, OK, but the thing is, I have to connect in Reykjavík and delaying the flight by an hour and a half will probably make me miss the flight. And if I miss the flight in Iceland, I won’t make it to Baltimore in time to get my flight to Our Fair City. And then I won’t be able to drive to Buffalo with Finbar in time for his parents’ anniversary party—you know, the one we’re hosting. Nothing to be done about that right now, I guess. Wonder what’s to eat in this airport?

I was appalled to discover that the defining culinary opportunity at Frankfurt International Airport is McDonald’s. And the place was swarming with loud Americans and their ill-behaved children, screaming at each other in English and generally acting like the stereotype of the Ugly American. Now, I don’t particularly care for McD’s in the States to begin with, although I do occasionally get the urge for a Big Mac (usually followed by the realization that there’s a reason why I don’t normally eat at McD’s), and I have philosophical issues with eating at McD’s in a foreign country (why go 7,000 miles and eat/do the same things you do at home? Not to mention my general unease with the effects of what one might call “McDonaldization” in the wider world). There were, it’s true, some other options: an expensive “Tex-Mex” bar (complete with plastic Corona banners), an expensive pasta restaurant, and an extremely expensive sit-down restaurant. Faced with those choices, I decided to either eat the cheese crackers and beef jerky in my backpack or wait for food service on the flight. There were still Euros burning a hole in my wallet, and I’d held off on buying German magazines the entire time I’d been in Landshut so that I’d have a pleasant diversion to look forward to on the long flight.

There was a small Presseladen downstairs, and I bought a gigantic stack of magazines, which probably technically put me over the weight limit for baggage. Good thing no one weighs a carry-on at the gate. I went through security, which took maybe 2 minutes, since no one was in line and started wandering around the gate areas, savoring my last chance to move freely before I strapped in for the first leg of a really long trip in the cramped quarters of Economy Class (otherwise known as Deep-Vein-Thrombosis Class). Back in the corner of the far wing of the gate areas, I found a little gourmet grocery. Heaven! I bought Brie and Salami and fresh Semmel and a cup of Griesbrei and a tiny little bottle of red wine. Then I bee-lined it back to Gate 26, where I spread out a little epicurean feast on top of my carry-on and thoroughly enjoyed the wait for boarding.