2009 - July 31 (Baku)

I wake up for my departure day. Being a compulsive geek I get to my computer to check mail. I have 13 messages in last four hours. And most are from Roy. A disaster seems to be looming. Flight delays in Memphis and now that Northwest if part of the Delta, you get that wonderful Delta-family service. That of a red-headed step-child. He may wind up missing his connecting flight and have to stay overnight to get the overseas leg of his flight. Great.

I pull my bags together, check out, and wait for my ride to the airport. The morning (4AM) is quiet. No breeze and a bit sultry. There are people around on the streets a bit more today. Night clubs are starting to close. People walking around obviously with too much under their belt. It surprises me that men and women are wandering around the very dark streets without any apparent concern of street crime. People are walking down alleys by themselves and I wouldn't walk down them during the day without some concern. My driver arrives and we are off to the airport. The drive takes about 40 minutes without traffic. I see something new as we leave the inner city. I see where the affluent people live. We pass multi-story homes with styles that would fit into any suburb in the West. And lights are on. Often entire upper stories are brightly lit. I can't see the lower stories because of the walls surrounding these residential enclaves. It seems to reveal another secret of Baku, the class difference between people. Really no different than how we live. The separations are not apparently due to cultural or racial difference, although I may simply not be observant enough about differences in facial structures, skin tones, and manner of dress. It all seems purely economic. The Great Divide.

Getting to the airport I say goodbye to Zohrab, who has made sure I got to every place I needed to be this entire week. He was nice and helpful even though we could only exchange the simplest of ideas. I head in and a gentleman asks me where I am going. I tell him and he asks if I had a ticket. Telling him I have an e-ticket, he leads me over to the Aeroflot window. A lady is coming out from the office area beside the window. He speaks to her. She looks at me and says "No tickets today". I tell her I was expecting to get a ticket here. She says again "NO TICKET TODAY!" with emphasis. She asks "You want to buy ticket?" I tell her I have already paid for it. She shrugs and asks for my passport. She goes back behind the window and types a bit on her terminal. She then says "You have e-ticket. Wait for terminal to open." Well I already knew I had an e-ticket so I wonder what that "No Ticket" bull was about. Bad day in the Former Soviet Union. FSU . Which does NOT mean Florida State University.

The gentleman who was assisting me directs me to a place to sit and stands nearby. We wait about 15 minutes and he then takes a hold of my roller bag and says we can go now. He pulls my bag along and I realize that he is one of the "friends" who will help you out for a small gift or tip. I had thought so. Thought I would be too smart for them this time. Rube from the sticks gets taken by boys from the Big City again. I give him ten Manats that I had previously put in my pocket for jut such an event. He was happy, I was happy, and he loaded the heavy bag onto the transport belt for scanning through security. I guess it was okay, if not really worth it. Maybe next time I will be a bit brighter. Probably not. Once a chump, always a chump.

I get through security and baggage check in, getting my boarding pass and admission card to the lounge. Heading to the lounge I get admitted and finally feel I am on my way.

Oops! Spoke too soon. I realize that the ticket agent only printed a single boarding pass, not two. So I ask for Aeroflot staff to help me. The lady who speaks to met takes my pass and disappears. She comes back and checks to see where my bags are going (to Amsterdam), but maybe not me. She goes away again and comes back. First she says I should check at the gate. I know they do not issue boarding passes there and tell her so. Then she says to check in Moscow airport. I point out that the boarding passes stations seem to be outside the international section of the terminal. And I have no papers for leaving and entering the international section. She says I must solve the problem in Moscow. This is not good! I go through gate security. The scanners are down so the gentleman with the serious black wand has a once-over of me. I pass. No special gas scanner, no 3D X-ray scanner, no power up of all my electronics. Somethings have gotten more relaxed.

Off to my gate. Interesting. My boarding pass says Gate 5. There are only gates 1 through 4. I stop a man and ask about the Moscow flight. "You must wait for it." And he walks away. So I stand and wait. Suddenly I see group of people move enmasse to Gate 4 from Gate 3. I ask the suddenly free gate attendant about Moscow. "Gate 4, Gate 4, Moscow!" Okay. I head to Gate 4.

A man takes my boarding pass at the gate. He takes half of it and motions me down a stairway, not a jet way. At the bottom is a bus. We travel to a plane on the tarmac. Up some stairs and onto the plane. My seat is nice. The attendants are pleasant. They take my breakfast order (apple pancakes) and I settle in. The safety briefing begins:

"Seat belt fastened this way. Don't worry about how unfasten it. Opens by itself in crash.
Life vest is only ornamental. Does not inflate. No problem. We fly over land.
If lose cabin pressure, mask falls from the ceiling. Please return to attendant. Is part of former Soviet system and very expensive. Please ignore bright red "Gas Mask" letters on side. Has not been needed in years.
Enjoy flight."

We take off. Breakfast is served.

First course is roasted cold chicken breast, cheeses, grapes, olives, and tomatoes. They serve warm rolls and croissants and real butter.

(To the tune of the Beatles - Toast and Marmalade For Tea")
"Toast and marmalade for me,
I had better just agree.
For if I whine or beg,
Then the Gulag's my next leg."

Coffee is joke. Black but only tastes of water. But the pancakes are wonderful. Makes up for everything. They are actually crepes (this is what we will have in Amsterdam also). They are filled with white raisins and diced apples, and are in a mote of vanilla cream sauce. Very rich, hot, and delicious. They serve two but one is all I can finish. That is a pity. Now for three hours of flight.

I then decide to try and get more help about my Amsterdam boarding pass.I go to the attendant and explain my concern. She tells me that it is not a problem. She explains that there is a transfer desk in the international section of the airport and they can print one for me without a problem. I do not know if she is giving me good information or just making pleasant statements to make me sit down and not bother her. But at least it gives me some temporary peace of mind. Maybe a nap.

The nap was no-go-ski. A baby in coach cried for the two and a half hours of the flight. So I listened to my audiobooks. That has saved me through most of my trip. So I ride out the flight ignoring the baby and immersed in my story. We land at Moscow at Sheretemyevo Airport. I hit the Transit desk and the nice lady there, who doezs speak pretty good English, listens to my problem and asks me to wait a few minutes while she clears the arrival backlog. She must have called for assistance since another lady shows up and verifies my problem. She takes me through security and then onto an office where she talks with several people. She then says they will issue my boarding pass at 1:30 if I will return to the office with my passport. I ask about where I can go and explain that I am a business traveller. She goes away for a few minutes and comes back with a pass for the first class lounge. She gives me directions (pointing left and saying"turn right") and I am off in the directio she points. Good guess. I arrive at the lounga and they welcome me in. It is a very nice lounge with lots of comfortable chairs, buffet tables, and beverage kiosks. I settle in for a wait since it is only 10:30. Three hours is not long when the waiting location is nice.

I have a wonderful conversation in the lounge with an older couple who were from Miami and had just finished a 14 day river trip from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Sounds like a trip worth taking. As would be the norm, you board the river boat (barge) and it is your floating hotel for you trip. You stop a day or two at several points along the way. Sounded really neat. Roy, add that to our bucket list. They also suggested that I visit the Singapore Zoo at night on my next visit. It is an open zoo where the visitors are the one in cages. And the night visit is when all the animals are out and around. I will have to do that since they drive you around rather than sweat and chafe during the day.

I wait, and wait. The time drags on to the appointed time for me to resolve my boarding pass problem. Okay, I finally get too twitchy to sit still. I go back to the Transit office. I start to explain to a lady at the desk why I am there. She calls out to someone in the back. Another tall, young, blonde, attractive lady comes out. She asks for my passport, asks me to take a seat and says she needa to go somewhere (Uh Oh). Then she turns back, says she just needs to log in at the gat, and asks me if I want an aisle or window seat. I froze. I was still pretty flustered about the whle process. She waits and watches me. I feel like a third grade student being called on in class without being prepared. I finally get enough gray cells working to tell her aisle and off she goes. I wait, still like a third grader, this time waiting in the principle's office for punishment. Total pins and needles. This is all unnecessary. The FSU is gone. Stalin is gone. Hell, even Gorbachov is gone. I don't need to be so worried. The old horror stories are just stories now. I hope.

Tick ... Tock ..... Tick ....... Tock ......... Tick .............

I wait. And wait. The knot in my stomach is getting to be the size of a baseball. Maybe a softball. Now it is the size of a cantalop?, cantaloupe?, cantalope?,..., honeydew melon. The first girl who helped me comes in. In her hand is a passport, a boarding pass, and a pass to the guest lounge. I am good to go!!!!! Downside ... Downgraded from First Class lounge to Europe Select Amber lounge. So I don't get the finger sandwiches with the crusts cut off, and the leather chairs. I can live with that. The coffee machines also serve Coffee Americano and not just Cappuccino/Espresso/Latte. And there are more handsome young guys and girls here than in the first lounge. I can live with that too. Hope they can. Now there is nothing but to relax with my audiobook. I am content.

Time to board. Head down to the gate. I want to note for everyone that I was told this airport was old Soviet style. Perhaps, but it is going through real facelifting. The international terminal could be located anywhere. Duty Free shops, currency exchange machines, Intergalactic fast food choices. The usual stuff. Workers are attending to their tasks. There are people who are around and will help you. Signs are in English sub-titles most if the time. And the gates and lounge areas are clearly marked. The only thing I could not figure out was how the currency exchange machines worked. Didn't matter anyway. No one will exchange Manats and Gopiks for Euros or Rubles anyway.

And now a burst of tall, blonde, handsome gentlemen come into the lounge. Soccer team?, preppies?, who knows? They are speaking English with and American accent. Scratch the soccer option then. Nice eye-candy though. Fills the time pleasantly.

Time to board. Get to plane and start boarding. DON'T PAY FOR BUSINESS CLASS ON KLM/AEROFLOT TO AMSTERDAM. Their Europe Select is shit! The seating exactly the same 6-across per row throughout the aircraft. It was very tight sitting down. The seats barely recline. This is a complete rip-off! The only apparent difference is about 4 inches more leg room. And this is for a three and a half hour flight. For which we paid a premium for our seats.

Add to this --- no American bourbons or whiskeys. When you ask for a whiskey and coke they try to give you a BLENDED (horror) Scotch! They should be beaten for such an error. And I believe European makers of whiskeys would agree. Scotch and Coke indeed!

They serve tea/dinner. It was certainly not the level that other air carriers provide. I eat only a few bites as I knew that I would be having dinner with Roy and possibly Kimberley this evening. And while I may fume about seats and aircraft, I want to give credit to the flight attendants, who worked very hard to accommodate our needs and make the flight as pleasant as they could. In that regard I did get first class treatment. They were wonderful.

I pass the time on the flight and before I realize it, I am landing at Schipol airport in Amsterdam. This end the Baku blog and I am not sure about making an Amsterdam blog. I may not want to talk about what I get into. And that does not mean the coffee shops or the red light district. We will just have to see what develops.