Category: travel

I found the Turkish airlines office and bought my tickets! I am now going to Greece dammit, nothing’s stopping me now… The office is on sharia siteen. If you come down Bagdad street towards siteen, turn left onto siteen and go for about a mile. It’s on the left.

OK, I now have a phone number and a general idea where the Turkish airlines office is. I don’t think that they have an actual, official office here, but they do seem to have two official agents here. They don’t take credit cards, so that means a trip to the ATM. I started out, but it started to rain. Of course it stopped as soon as I went inside. I think I’ll give it an hour or so and try again…

Horay! I’ve made my ticket reservation for Greece. I was hoping to be able to pay online and get an eticket like Emirates does, but no luck. Turkish airlines doesn’t offer that in Yemen. They do let you pick your seat online though, that’s pretty cool. Emirates can let you do that if your a member of their frequent flyer club. Anyway, they say I have to pick up my ticket by Aug. 29th, but they don’t tell me where. Not only that, but I can’t find anything online telling me where I should go either. I tried filling out a contact form, but all I got was an error message in Turkish, so that didn’t help. My strategy is this; I am going to the pizza place that is way way down Hadda street. If I see their office along the way, I’ll get out and see them. If not, I’ll have to start asking around at the various travel agents. Hmmm, I sure do hope they take credit cards!

Went down to the embassy at 12:00 and they said, no, I should come back at 12:30…. Grrr. I understand getting complicated things wrong sometimes, but the opening hour is pretty basic. Anyway, I went in and picked it up. Now I can travel again! Greece here I come!

The most “exciting” part of the trip was getting there. I asked a cabbie stopped in front of the nearby hotel if he would take me to the embassy. He said sure, but wait a sec. He took some glass bottles out of his trunk and filled up his gas tank. I had always wondered why many cabs smelled like gas, now I know… Then we had to push the car so he could pop it into gear and start the car. Sigh, I guess from now on I’ll just wait for the newer, metered cabs to come by. Not only do they start on their own, but they have seat belts and I bet they don’t store gasoline in their trunks…

Emirates is having a special on using frequent flyer miles from sept. 11 to Oct. 11 and I think I’ll take advantage of it. They’ve cut the miles needed in half for that time, so I think I’ll go to Damascus. I’ve wanted to go there for quite a while, and it’s relatively affordable. Since the flight will be free, all I’l have to do is pay for the hotel and meals. I do have to check into the visa issue, and I’ll also have to go down to the American embassy about my passport. I only have three more pages in it for visas. That’s mostly because every entry and exit visa from Yemen takes up an entire page. I’ve got three entry visas and 3 exit visa. Add to that the entire page taken up by my Chinese visa (and they stamped a separate page too, grr…) and the other stamps from the US, Malta, and the UAE and I’m down to the last several pages. I’ll need one to get out of Yemen, one to get back in, and I’ll probably need one for Greece (when I travel with dad and Butler). Hmmm, I better get on that soon, don’t want to be caught with a passport I can’t use…

It became obvious at JFK that TSA (or other people) were paying special attention to me. The hoops I had to jump through and the number of people that handled and checked off on my boarding pass was impressive. I always expected something like this really, people are just too paranoid to expect anything else. I do wish that they’d use a little sense though. If I were a terrorist (and for any government types that might be reading this, I am most certainly not one) and wanted to do something on a plane, I wouldn’t tell them that I was flying to Sana’a , I’d fly to Hackensack or something. Plus, why all the scrutiny on my way there? I would expect more on the way back. On my way back into the US, the immigration guy at JFK did ask me why I went to the places I did. He seemed happy with my answer (I’m a student) and didn’t press further. IF there needs to be more scrutiny (and I don’t think there needs to be in this case), why not have it when I’m coming back into the country? Anyway, this was the first time that I have seen any indication that my government is suspicious of me. Hopefully, some people that have some clout will read this blog and see where I stand so I don’t have all of the hurdles to jump through next time….

Got to National with no problems, but the line at the Delta counter was enormous. It took almost an hour to get through that, but I finally got my boarding passes for my flight and my connecting one at JFK. Went to the security screening and I was “selected for additional screening.” There were a couple of other people there too so I didn’t feel too weird, I figured my number just came up. Delta was a mess, my flight was supposed to arrive at JFK at 7:20, we actually got there at 9:30. Luckily, I already had my boarding pass and my flight didn’t leave until 11:00. It turns out that Delta had given me a piece of paper that said “boarding pass” on it but it was not, in fact a boarding pass. I had to go back up to the counter (luckily Eremites has a no checked baggage line that was really short) and then go back down to the security screening. I noticed that the agent at the counter had made some furious scribbles on my boarding pass, when I got to the person that checked the pass against the passport she said, “You have been selected for additional screening,” and made some more scribbles on my pass. GROAN, went through the whole thing again, I’m sure it was random, right? Each person that handled my boarding pass highlighted something or scribbled something on it. I got through all that and stood in line at the gate. A woman was going along the line spot checking passes. I showed her mine, she said, “Isaac Crawford, right? I’ll be right back.” She took it to the guys at the counter and eventually brought it back without any explanation. What a hassle but it didn’t matter, the flight left an hour late and then we sat on the tarmac for another 50 minutes.

I’m beginning to get the idea that JFK is the worst airport in the world, lots of delays all the time and the terminals are a total mess. When I got off of the Delta flight, there was no indication that there were other terminals let alone how to get to them. It involved a decent hike and the use of an elevator and a train to get over to the next terminal. I met a really cool woman named Kelly that I’ll probably never see again (although she seemed to think otherwise for some reason, “That’s the way things work,” she said when I said goodbye) that I managed to mislead time and time again. There was no ulterior motive, it was pure incompetence. It got to the point that if I guessed which elevator would come up first, she would automatically move to the other one, and be correct… Anyway, she’s a teacher at the American school in Bangladesh having transferred from Tanzania. Like I said, she’s pretty cool and made the JFK and Dubai part of the trip bearable.

The flight was insane, there were approx. 10,000 little kids on the flight. To be honest, most of them were very good, I didn’t even notice them until late in the flight. There were a couple of problem children of course, including one baby that was, as far as I could tell, pure evil. It screamed and screamed. Not in a “I’m in pain and I can’t talk yet,” kind of scream, but more of a “ME ME ME ME ME!!” scream. It spent most of its waking hours screaming at the top of its lungs, but if it got distracted, it would stop for 30 or 40 seconds and then start again. That tells me that it wasn’t under any sort of terrible duress, it was just evil…

Needless to say, I didn’t get any sleep on the flight, none to speak of at least. Between the screaming infant, the cramped seating (I think I have bruises on my knees for God’s sake) and my general inability to sleep on planes, I was exhausted when I hit Dubai. I had to say goodbye to Kelly because I was falling asleep in my chair, I went to the “quiet lounge” and slept for about 4 and 1/2 hours, I couldn’t believe it. I knew I’d sleep through her boarding time, so I just said “See Ya” before I passed out. Good thing I did, I was out cold…

I’m pretty excited about the milage I’ve accumulated, not only have I gotten more miles to spend, but after this trip is through, I will be bumped up to the next level of their frequent flyer program. That gives me a bonus on the miles I earn and I get to check in and board with the business class folks too. I’m most excited about the prospect of using the business class lounge in Dubai though. Hopefully this means no more sleeping on the floor! The first class lounge has a shower, that would be nice but I’ll be happy with an overstuffed chair:-)

OK, so the trip was not so good. It turns out that it is not my jaw, but a bad tooth. It was killing me all through Dubai, the flight, and waiting in NYC. I called my dentist from NYC and arranged an appointment. I got off of the plane at national airport and went straight there. He looked around and sent me to another doctor, one that only does root canals. I went there the next day. With a little (painful) exploration, he narrowed it down to one tooth. It has a vertical crack in it and probably has an abscess forming there too. His opinion was that the crack was too severe to do a root canal, so he recommends extraction…

I have to go to my dentist on monday and get this thing out. I’m not sure what’s going to happen. I’ve heard about implants and bridges, but I’m not sure how much they cost or how necessary they are. I’m also wondering if it is something I could have done back in Yemen. I really don’t want anyone there doing any surgery on me, but they could probably do an implant or bridge, it’s probably much cheaper there… Anyway, I’ll talk to my dentist tomorrow about my options. In the meantime, I’m on some serious pain killers. They make me very sleepy and I can’t think straight. With any luck I’ll be off of these things in a couple of days.

With all due apologies to John Fogerty… Yup, I’m in my most frequent haunt and there really isn’t much to do except take advantage of the free wi-fi. Here’s some random observations:

Good God my computer is filthy! I’m using it in decent light for the first time in who knows when and I am appalled. I’m going to have to do some serious cleaning when I get back.

I saw a couple of Yemeni girls get on the plane that stood out a bit. They were both wearing hijabs and baltos, but one was sporting some Italian styled sunglasses (huge ones with sparkly things on the sides) and the other had “Dior” written in rhinestones on her hijab. I’m no fashion maven, but I’m pretty sue that Dior is not making hijabs, and I’m pretty damn sure that they would not use rhinestones if they did.

I thought I had a toothache, but now I think it’s actually my jaw joint (TMJ) on my left side. I’m thinking this because the pain moves around a bit and it seems to subside if I keep my jaw in a certain position. That’s good, I think. I really can’t afford any actual dental work at this point, hopefully I’ve just tweaked the joint and it’ll heal on it’s own (can you sprain a TMJ?) The bad news is that the position that minimizes the pain leaves me with a slack jaw, so I sit around with my mouth slightly open looking like an idiot. Whatever, this thing hurts like hell sometimes, I’ll look like an idiot if I can minimize that.

It’s 102 degrees here in Dubai along with the usual humidity, Oi!

I continue to be amazed at the music offered on the Emirates in flight entertainment. I heard two (two!) Rolling Stones songs that I had never heard, one of which (We Love You) had both John Lennon and Paul Mcaurtney doing backing vocals. They also played “Death of a Clown” by Ray Davies (not with the Kinks as I had thought) and a Syd Barrett song that I can’t remember the name of right this second. A really good mix… Those were all from the year 1967, when they went to 1977, you could really tell which was the better year. The late 70’s had some of the most amazing rock and roll ever being made (Sex Pistols, Talking Heads, Ramones, the Clash, etc.) but the charts were dominated by the likes of Debbie Boone, Peter Frampton, and Olivia Newton-John. God was she terrible. I managed to miss her whole pre Grease, “Let’s Get Physical” career. “I Honestly Love You,” and “Sam” are all I ever need to hear to thank my lucky stars. At least they didn’t play “Jazzman” by Carol King, that was another inexplicable hit in the late 70’s. I’m chalking it up to the bad taste in general during that time. The clothes, the hair, the TV, etc.

I will never, ever fly without noise canceling headphones. Even if you’re not listening to music, maybe especially if you’re not listening to music, they are a godsend. It’s alarming how loud the cabin of an airplane is, and it’s even more alarming to hear how loud you usually play music to overcome it. I keep them on my head when I attempt to go to sleep. The really cool thing is that everything else, announcements, conversations, etc. are much easier to hear when you cut the ambient noise by 20db or so. Seriously, get some of these for your next trip, they’re not that expensive, 40-50 bucks, but your ears and nerves will thank you. I use a lithium AA battery in mine and get 20-30 hours out of a single battery.

I’ll probably post more as I get bored…

I’ll catch my plane tomorrow at 10M. That means I should be there at 7, which means I’ll have to get up at 5:30 GROAN… I always get thrown off by this, I look at my itinerary and think, “Hmm, 10AM flight to Dubai, 11:30PM flight to NYC, arrive at NYC at 7:30AM and fly out of there at 1PM, arrive at DC around 2ish.” Not too bad until I realize that I’ll most likely be awake for more than 20 hours during the next 24… I hope I can sleep this time. Now that I’m a member of their frequent flyer program, I can pick my seat if I do it early enough. I figure 12 hours is plenty of time… I hope to get a seat up close to the business class section (and near the emergency exit) so that I can have some actual leg room. The only potential drawback to that is that area is also where they put the babies… I’ll take it, I then have at least a chance to get some sleep…