Where Is My Home... ?

Where Is My Home... ?
June 11 - 30, 2001
about Air France, a wild lamb dinner, and journey back "home"



	Golden Gate then...

The title of this entry is also the first verse of Czech National Anthem. I would have never thought that the topic could touch me personally.

Leaving our home, Sid took me to an airport, which I departed from, going -- home. Sid followed me later, we lived through our Mother-in-law Storm and our vacation and flew back -- home again. I know, it is somewhat confusing, and the closest description of it is a feeling that I've been staying in two distinct space-time continua, which don't intersect and don't correlate.

Before leaving, though, we scheduled a visit to the City (San Francisco), mostly to our favorite Golden Gate Bridge. Its construction began on January 5, 1933, and it was open for traffic on May 28, 1937; work on and for it never stopped - steel must be continuously re-painted to protect it from corrosion. Those of you who dwell on numbers - the bridge is suspended by two cables, each with a diameter of 36 3/8 inches (92.4 cm), consists of 27,572 steel wires and is 7,650 feet (2,331.7 m) long. Summary length of wire used to manufacture these two cables reaches 80,000 miles (about 129,000 km), and their weight is 24,500 tons. The bridge itself is 6,450 feet long, accommodating six lanes of highway traffic. Besides that, it is very beautiful.



	... and today.

Having had a proper farewell day with California, I let myself be put on a flight to Europe with Air France. A window seat paid off this time, -- the weather was clear and direct European flights turn right above Golden Gate, continuing on over Lake Tahoe, Canada, Hudson Bay, Greenland and Iceland. There's always something to watch. Unfortunately right behind me, a mother and two children were seated. Two hours later I had blue spots on my back from well aimed kicks, and nerves in tatters. I kept telling myself to calm down, to be tolerant to small kids who get bored during long flights, but when their mother with a proud smile watched her daughter jump up and down on her seat, holding on to my seat so that it kept nicely banging into my head, I started throwing mean looks. I kept doing that, joined by my neighbor, for next hour or so, to no avail. As the din behind my back did not tend to diminish, in the middle of the next "dance", I quickly pushed my seat back a few times. The little girl and her mom got scared (I hope) - but that was the end of it and I could even have a small nap. They say being nice is a key to a success - well maybe so, until you hit a moron or a mucker - I guess some people deserve rough treatment.

During our landing in Paris we had a great opportunity to watch La Defence and the Eiffel Tower, in my case slightly mired by my lamb dinner, which tasted great a few hours back, but in the end demanded vehemently to be let out. At touch down, cold sweat stood out on my forehead and I believe I broke the record in fastest time to disembark.

I was looking forward to sparkling clean airport toilets, which, unlike the dump on the plane, would NOT smell worse than a fourth class pub bathroom back in the socialist times, but I was being naive. Charles de Gaule may have been a famous general, but if the airport should remind us of him, then he also had to be intensely schizophrenic, confused, utterly impractical, and he did not wash too often. I found the toilets, and they lacked toilet tissue, they were small, fuliginous, and rancid (try to imagine corresponding facilities of the Central Railroad Station in Prague, 1980).

Still on the plane they showed us a short film instructing us how to change to our connecting flights, and I followed their advice in good faith, expecting it to be easy. Having thus entered the EU (continuing to Vienna), I was to pass a border control. The movie emphasized that in order to reach Terminal D, I had to pass. Having done so I concluded I found myself in Terminal D. I figured out the number of the gate my plane was leaving from (56) and marched there. To my surprise, a sign was announcing a flight to Los Angeles. The clerk was not busy with anybody so I stepped up to her, asking for help. Her answer? "Can't you read? This is a flight to L.A." I assured her that I was thoroughly literate and THAT EXACTLY was the reason I was asking her for a flight to Vienna. She snorted disdainfully that it went from Terminal D, this being Terminal C, and I should go to the building over there. Saddened, I hastened away in the given direction, reckoning I would either find some subway, or learn to fly. The buildings were separated by several levels of intertwined freeway ramps.

I eventually discovered a sign with an arrow, cowering behind a tobacco store. The arrow pointed downstairs, to something that could be a boiler-room, or toilets. The second alternative began to emerge as desirable again (my lamb dinner was not giving up so easily), so I went there. I found not only a bathroom, but a tunnel between the terminals as well (I'm not sure about the boiler-room, though).

All that was left was to find the right gate, and of course, it was the one where one only had to jump over few bags of cement, avoid bumping into a cement-mixer, and duck under some scaffolding. Another clerk attending this establishment admitted there were restrooms inside there somewhere, but she was not sure where exactly.

Despite two more rounds of my tough fight with my lamb, the wait before takeoff was excruciating. I got another window seat, so I had to climb over two people. The first time I simply smiled apologetically, but later, my top artistic number was jumping over their lunch trays.



	My "home town" - Prague

Vienna airport has its own specialty -- carts that you may rent -- for a ten-schilling. You even get the coin back when you return the cart, but just try to put yourself in the situation of a foreign tourist, who just arrived from somewhere OUTSIDE Austria (e.g. from Moscow), and even in the case he changed his money already, he would probably only hold banknotes. There's a change machine at the cart rail that will accept coins of other currencies and produce a ten-schilling, usually at a cutthroat rate -- as long as you hold such coins. I was already equipped with my ten-schilling (Sid had the honor of having been to Vienna before), hence I avoided getting angry over this trap, worrying only how to use this priceless token on a cart that would not refuse to roll.

I picked up my luggage and was bound for a bathroom again -- entering the said through an automatic door with my full load represents yet another permanent experience of my European vacation. This visit, however, had the soothing effect of delivering me from terrible bellyaches. Filled with optimism, I faced my 100 mile journey to Brno, and rolled on to rent a car.

One of the reasons we have selected Vienna as our starting point to our European trip was to make sure that we get a decent car (e.g., a VW golf) and not a Skoda, which we would get in Prague. Therefore I was unpleasantly surprised when I found out that I was to drive away in a fabia (a new Skoda model). But I always wanted to try it out (one can always hope for a turn to betterment), not mentioning that I was depleted of all energy after my suffering a la Air France, and did not want to argue, since there were only few hours at the wheel ahead of me.



	Somebody finally got the idea to open a place in Prague, where you can practice mastering tens both on the wall and on the bar

I stuffed my bags into the trunk and drove off. Perhaps I really was not as alert -- only after I realized I was sweating like a horse, all the way to Znojmo, I noticed the car had an A/C; and only when I got out in Brno, I noticed a big sign DIESEL on the tank, which did explain why the fuel gauge practically did not leave "FULL" throughout the whole 100 miles, and the fact that the car had very little umph.

There was more road to go, to Prague, on Monday. I had no idea how much I got used to American driving style - people observing speed limits and exhibiting courtesy. Once I drove up behind a truck, I simply signaled left and automatically expected a car on my left to leave me some room. It sped up instead, almost jumped into my trunk, flashing its lights furiously and letting me know how my measly 90 mph cause a grave inconvenience. Some light green fabia zipped past me, it had to go at least 100 -- I met it again few miles farther on, its front smashed into a service vehicle, the one they use to mow grass along the road...

I ran only a few errands on Monday in Prague (like seeing my mom and meeting Vendulka, whom I know from Invisible Dog Cafe (chatroom). The rest of the day is shrouded in haze -- I got a bad cold and a fever. I feebly remember partying with about thirty people at Boulder Bar, where I managed to talk without interruption for nine full hours. By two in the morning I was only capable of making sounds somewhere between to cock-a-doodle-do and wheezing; this I kept for the rest of the week.

Sid was to arrive on Sunday, which made all things somewhat tense, as Saturday news mentioned some strike inside Air France. I quickly called Sid who was just leaving for the airport, and he found out from his end that his flight was not affected. Still, we mysteriously missed each other at Vienna airport - I waited right outside the customs door, and he went through that door, and I did not see him (despite his formidable frame!!!). Then, suddenly, I spotted him, angry and foaming, pushing through the hall towards our alternative meeting spot. Is it possible that some mean UFOs rearranged our time-space continuum and separated us for a while??? :-) ?

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