My Less-Than-Amazing Race

I've arrived back from the Copenhagen talks, about which more anon, but I'm compelled to give an account of my journey home. This required me to travel through snowstorms in both Europe and America, and while it could have been worse -- I could have, for example, been among those who were stuck for some 11 hours on a Eurostar train under the English Channel -- it was enough of an ordeal to make an okay story. 

To begin:

-- Direct flight to Washington canceled on Sunday morning. Waited 7 hours at the Copenhagen airport.

-- Rude ticket agent gets me on a plane to Frankfurt, instructs me not to ask questions "or you'll miss your flight."

-- Plane to Frankfurt delayed several hours.

-- Arrive in Frankfurt, wait an hour to get luggage.

-- The Frankfurt airport has no visible signs, arrows or even information desks. Finally run into someone who can give me a hotel voucher.

-- Discover the hotel shuttle vans hold about 7 people, but at least 50 people are waiting for the shuttles, which arrive every 15 minutes. Look for a cab.

-- Find out the hotel, which is called "Airport West," is nowhere near the airport. Cab drivers do not know where it is.

-- Locate the hotel's address, spend 40 Euros on a cab. Soothing Turkish pop music on the ride over. Fresh snow on the freeway and little plowing done. 

-- Wait in line to get a room.

-- Watch German TV program about one woman's quest to cook the biggest schnitzel in the world (a riesenschnitzel). 

-- To prepare the schnitzel, the chef requires a special factory-made oven.

-- The pig weighs 160 kilos.

-- After rolling out the raw meat into a circle, they use a tape measurer to get the radius.

-- But there is an obstacle: The chef's pet ferret has escaped from its cage and is lost. During preparation, it might try to eat the schnitzel.

-- The chef recaptures the ferret.

-- Once they are done cooking, it is not enough just to bring the schnitzel out of the oven; it also needs to taste good. ("Der Schnitzel muss am Ende auch schmecken.")

-- The schnitzel is maneuvered onto the table, accompanied by the opening bars from Richard Strauss's "Also Sprach Zarathusthra."

-- There is a pineapple in the middle of the schnitzel.

-- The next TV program is about racing on the autobahn from Munich to Dusseldorf. That sounds dangerous.

-- Return to the Frankfurt airport.

-- The Air India employee tells me I have a paper ticket for a flight to Newark., but it was not actually booked. She informs me this is true for everyone from Copenhagen who was rerouted onto this flight. In German, I believe she tells her colleague to book me on the plane but turn away everyone else who arrives later.

-- Flight to Newark is three hours late. On the ride over, watch a Bollywood movie and eat a good lunch.

-- Arrive in Newark. Wait two hours for luggage and customs.

-- Train to D.C. is an hour and a half late, with no time estimates on the board.

-- Train takes an hour longer than usual due to weather.

-- Arrive in D.C. but some of the train's doors do not open. Bottleneck of people and their suitcases.

-- Arrive at home, immediately get sick.

Comments

[Christa]

And I hear it's freezing rain in Iowa over the next couple days... ah well, what's a little more adventure for the holidays?