One more flight

...skipping ahead...to set the scene, let's just say I slept very little the night before my flight and wasn't feeling my usual enthusiasm about being on an airplane. But I am somewhat fascinated by air travel, so I include this here. If airplanes don't interest you, skip to the next post.

The flight from Vienna to Damascus was far more crowded and chaotic than the flight from JFK to Milan. Entire clans seemed to be on board, including lots of children. Before the flight took off there was a great deal of negotiating betweeen the Arab passengers and the Austrian flight attendants about seating arrangements, so that family members could be next to each other or children looked after and so forth. Actually most of the discussions occurred between passengers, who swapped themselves around as needed to satisfy the social requirements of a three hour trip. This went on for about twenty minutes. Meanwhile, the airline had the most excellent foresight to put Donald Duck cartoons on the overhead screens and hand out small coloring books and packets of crayons to the children. This kept most of them in line, but a few were difficult to get corraled into whatever seats the social scrum had assigned to them. The plane, however, was eventually able to take off.

When the seat belt light turned off about a dozen people stood up and began wandering around the cabin socializing. More seats were traded, and friends who had not so far noticed each other on the plane greeted each other with a zeal normally reserved for those who have been separated many years, though in this case its possible the time was much less. These are very friendly people.

I was amazed at the amount of service the stewardesses had to provide during the flight. Headphones were distributed for an inflight movie. A meal was served, complicated by the large number of vegetarian and other special meals, which were laid out for the stewardesses on serving charts rendered useless by the seat exchanges. They were still slowly making their way down the ailse as the plane began to shake side to side from turbulance. I worried about the sanctity of my new white dress shirt (I like to fly in style.) The more senior flight attendant with the food managed to get thorough the plane without too much hassle, and without dropping a tray of food on me. But, the younger one following her with the drink cart bounced side to side with a plastic cup in one hand and a bottle of soda in the other, attempting to pour drinks without pouring them on the floor or any passengers. She was mostly successful at that. People who had just opened their food trays made numerous requests and complaints to her. She looked desparate to finish her trek down the ailse. I felt pity for her, but this display was much more entertaining than the movie.

I was in the back row, ailse seat, last to be served. She saw my amusment at her distress and smiled herself and asked me "so what exactly would you like to drink sir?", with mock enthusiasm. I asked for just a bottle of water. "No cup, no ice?", she asked.

This time I wasn't drinking Jack, and I wanted her life to be easier, so I said "no, just the bottle will be fine." She sighed with relief, thanked me, handed me the small plastic bottle and quickly pushed her cart into the service area at the back of the plane before anyone else could ask anything of her.

By the time I was finishing my food, a queue had formed for the bathroom which was directly behind me. As people squeezed by on their way to and from, various mid-section body parts were thrust in my face. I could only take so much and decided to go for a walk. First I tried going all the way up to the front, but that didn't take very long and meanwhile the line for the bathroom had gotten longer. So I went to the back, squeezed past the bathroom line and behind the curtain that hid the flight attendants from the outside world. The two servers were back there, eating their lunches. I asked them if I could hang out with them for awhile and explained the problem I was having with my seat providing too much opportunity to examine everyone else's. They were nice enough to let me stay back there, where I spent most of the rest of the flight chatting with them. Not much to report there, their stories are pretty well described in the post you have just read. Same thing, repeat.

Still, it was very nice to spend the flight standing, rather than sitting, having a mundane conversation in English, just before finding myself in Damascus airport completely alone and with little idea of what I was doing. But that's the next post. Oops, I said that last post, but this time I mean it.

L'ufficio uggetti smarriti

Malpensa airport is not overrun with gypsy thieves as some travel guides had suggested. It was here that I made my first attempts at speaking Italian, to ask where the lost baggage office was. As my Italian phrase book suggested, I asked someone, "Sa dove l'ufficio oggetti smarriti?" They had no idea. Or they didn't speak Italian. Or, most likely, *I* didn't. Anyhow, I found the office on my own, and fortunately the people there spoke English. I would come to find nearly everyone at the airport spoke English, but I kept trying my Italian out when asking for simple things or just to say 'grazzie'. The woman behind the counter and I did have to do a bit of charades and repetition to get our point across, but the resulting story was that my suitcase, in all likelihood, would arrive the next day. She surprised me when she said they would deliver it to my hotel. Still, I was concerned I would be spending the next few months living with only the things that were in my carry-on.

I went from there to an ATM where, for the first time in my life, I used my bank card to withdraw foreign currency - a request for 150 euros produced three 50 euro bills. I walked out of the airport and found a group of taxi drivers leaning on one of their cabs talking to one another. Not nearly as aggressive as other airports. I asked if anyone could take me to Somma Lombardo, to the Hotel Tre Leoni. One of them unenthusiastically took my bag and loaded it into his cab, a small white station wagon like most Italian taxis. Somma Lombardo is only about 4 km from the airport, but that was a long enough ride to discover the excitement of Italian roadways. Motorbikes and mopeds are as common as cars, and they weave in and out of traffic at will, often passing between to cars on the freeway by driving straight down the dividing line.

My hosts at Tre Leoni were very kind, but their English ranged from very limited to none at all. The reservation I had made online helped get past the initial paperwork. After that, whenever I wanted to do anything, like order food at a restaurant, I had to study my Italian dictionary a bit first. I was soon able to pronounce the words more correctly and get done what I needed.

But, I'm running way behind in my journal, (I'm actually typing this in Damascus), so I will have to skip the Italy part and save those stories for when I get home. Long story short, my luggage reappeared and I had a great time. I took lots of pictures, hopefully they come out ok. Next installment, Damascus.

update soon...

Hey folks, I'm definitely in Damascus..what a city, incredible. I haven't had time to update the journal online lately, but I've been writing on paper and will post it soon, hopefully this afternoon. Stay tuned.