flights - third installment

thought i'd never get back to this, didn't you?
well, perhaps it's fading from memory so i better do it now.

our dubai hotel transferred us to the airport for a late night flight- no curfew in dubai (have i already mentioned that?) the traffic getting to the terminal was chockers. i honestly thought for a while we'd be better off getting out and walking. re-considered when i thought of the four bags, three carry-on bags, two people and one baby that we'd be lugging along. got there in the end, in plenty of time.

airport security is an interesting thing these days. i think united arab emirates are not concerned if you what to smuggle out the nasty stuff. we were barely checked. paul did not have to take his lap top out of it's bag like at every other airport, no removal of shoes or other items and percy did not have to come out of the sling. maybe they figure if you're taking it out of the country it's someone elses responsibility..?

prior to boarding percy needed to be fed and changed. in vain did we look for a parents room. i intend to write to his highness sheikh khalifa bin zayed al nahyan, present ruler and president of the uae and tell him exactly what i think of his pathetic airport! considering it's new and supposedly all swanky and nice it's still smoky and bereft of facilities for parents. again, is it that hard to take three square metres and give people somewhere quiet and private to tend to their offspring?! they put these useless "smoking rooms", which have walls but no roofs and no ventilation, therefore not stopping the smoke spreading throughout the terminal, all over the place. it just makes me so angry!

i finally approached an information booth to be told there is a 'quiet' lounge near gate whatever. okay, off i go again. what the hell is a quiet lounge? and do they really expect it to be quiet once a baby is in it? i couldn't figure out where this lounge is so i go into the nearest airline lounge and ask them. no idea and no, i may not enter their hallowed turf for 15 minutes to feed and change my baby. i'm onto my fourth airline lounge, nearly in tears, when a angel appears. yet again, i am asking whether the information booth meant this lounge as the 'quiet' lounge. dopey, stupid looks and shaking heads. maybe it's the lack of english. a man standing next to me tells the dopey, stupid lookers that he now has a guest he would like to bring into the lounge- in english; everyone understands him! i turn to go and he says i'm his guest. god, did i cry. never seen this man before or since and he still makes me cry now. i think until you are in a desparate situation and a total stranger rescues you, you don't understand how much it means. (plus, i suppose i'm still pretty hormonal!)
i have no idea how much it costs to have a guest in a airport lounge but he wouldn't let me pay and tried to make me stop thanking him so much.
i found a quiet corner, turned a comfy chair away from everyone, feed percy peacefully, went into the ladies loo to change her in hygienic place (instead of the public toilets that made me blanche) and was all done in 20 minutes. i hope the other three lounges burn down.
i found my rescuer again and thanked him some more. there wasn't anything i could do in a material sense but i suspect he understood what a difference he made to me- he wore a wedding ring, maybe he has children too.

i returned to where paul was waiting at the gate and we boarded shortly afterwards.
this leg was much shorter. six hours to vienna (if i recall correctly) that passed without mishap. we did run into some turbulence just when we were changing percy. the crew were directing everyone back to their seats and tried to insist we go too. turning your back on someone is an effective way of getting the message across that until your baby is clean and re-dressed your not moving. i understand the risk- in a past life i was a hostie. i think flinging a poo-filled nappy at the crew would have been my next move.
they insisted i sit down in the nearest row as soon as we were done and paul was sent back to our regular seats. about ten minutes later the crew decided i was in the wrong seat, roughly grabbed me by the arm and marched me back to my seat. did i mention we were flying austrian? did i mention europeans suck? they haven't a clue about customer service. i have a theory about austrians in particular but you're not going to like it. however i can't resist so skip the next paragraph if you're sensitve about WWII, hitler, etc.
theory: the austrians are still sensitive about the fact that they are the birth place of hitler and that the course of history might have been different had they just let him into art school. they've got a chip on their shoulder about the size of western europe, think everyone hates them and act in a correspondingly hateful manner.
it's just a theory. if i have caused any offence to nice austrians (yet to meet one) i'm sorry.

we landed in vienna with only an hour transit time. that was nice. the last hour and 45 minutes to kiev was with tyrolean. it was with these guys we had our argument about not taking percy out of the sling for landing. she was fast asleep. we stuck to our guns and won. afterall, what were they going to do? not land the plane until we complied?
rules are meant for the lowest common denominator, not the intrepid and the creative. gee- am i blowing my own trumpet?

this could open an interesting debate about which rules too... i think road rules should apply to everyone equally. just because micheal schumacher can drive with skill that should keep him safe at high speed shouldn't let him do so on ordinary roads. if you are "creative" in avoiding paying taxes, should you be allowed to? etc...

that was our last flight. until this friday and other future dates. we'd arrived with all limbs and thankfully all luggage. the anxiety proved worse than the experience. and of course memory in new parents isn't a strong point so perhaps the passage of time has taken the sting out.