Disclaimer: Day one is really three days, as we lost 12 ½
hours in time changes, our travel started Wednesday afternoon and ended Friday
morning.
Airplane travel has it highs and lows. The day started simply enough, Spokane to
Seattle was what every tiny plane trip is.
Spokane to Dubai is where the party starts. I’ll start by saying that up until this week,
my flying experience was exclusively with Southwest Airlines. The idea of assigned seats, in flight meals,
and weight limits on bags is a foreign concept to me.
The hijinx began in the church parking lot where we gathered
to pray and distribute some supplies we were taking along. I have left plenty of room in my bag for
them, so I load up. I then learn that
international travel tends to be pretty tough on bags, and since mine is pretty
worn already, I’m advised to pack in into someone else’s spare luggage. I comply, but then it’s over 50 pounds, which
apparently gains you a $75 charge on checked bags. Then came the event of several folks pulling
random things out of bags and tossing them into the collective spare. Underwear, socks, t-shirts, toothbrushes, and
post-it notes belonging to several different people then converge in a single
bag, and we take off for the airport with bags under 50 pounds.
There were a few new things to me on the Seattle flight, for
instance boarding the plane by actually walking out onto the runway and having
an assigned seat, but just like Southwest, I’m sitting on the back wing, so
it’s really not worth mentioning. The
real fun begins on the international flight.
Seattle to Dubai, fourteen hours and twenty minutes of excitement
becoming fear.
I flew on Emirates Airlines, and that was a treat. The stewardesses have an outfit that is very
abnormal to the North American eye, so the difference is apparent from the
moment you get on board. Then walking
through the plane kind of blew my mind.
I’m used to tiny little planes with two seats on either side of a single
aisle. Here we have three seats, aisle,
five seats, aisle, and then three more seats.
When I looked down the plane for the first time my thought was that the
entire plane I’m used to could fit inside this section. Then there were three more just like it. This plane was so much larger than I was used
to that it took a few moments for my mind to comprehend that flight could still
be possible.
I found my seat, and it was terribly uncomfortable, there
was a support cushion on the upper back that was clearly designed for shorter
people, taunting me with calls of “you’re not sleeping one bit on this flight”
the moment I sat down. Of course I found
out later that this was adjustable and could be made to go higher. And by later I mean I found out on the van
ride to the hotel in New Delhi.
However, as uncomfortable as I was, I became excited very
quickly. The screen in front of me was
running trailers for Captain America: Civil War, which was free to watch, along
with several other movies, TV, and music.
That was also a new experience for me. I am used to those screens being used to try
tricking me into spending a month’s utility bill on watching ESPN for 20
minutes. The final chunk of excitement
came when I was handed a menu for the meal.
Again, I’m used to pretzels, peanuts, and a cup of Coke passing for a
meal. This had dinner options, breakfast
options, snacks, and free booze. Also,
it all looked delicious. I was also
appreciative of the fact that the music playing through the speakers pre-flight
consisted of Let’s Fly Away, I Believe I Can Fly, I’m Like a Bird, and Rocket
Man. It was missing Leavin’ on a Jet
Plane, but otherwise it was perfect.
Eventually, that excitement faded. Dinner did not agree with my stomach nearly
as much as my taste buds. The back pain
started to sink in from my mysteriously adjustable seat, the cabin pressure
gave me an expected headache, my legs were feeling the effects of being on a
six foot one person, and the dinner and my stomach were playing rugby against
each other.
For the first time in several years, I threw up. I would not make it several years before I
threw up again. And again. And again.
Fittingly, for travel I had worn one of my favorite souvenir T-shirts
from the restaurant where I had the best burger of my life: “Yaks.” So it turned out I was wearing a premonition
and ironic character introduction for our flight attendants at the same time. With my stomach clear and my body aching, I
sat back down in my seat, comforted with the fact that the flight only had ten
hours and eleven minutes left before landing.
The nice thing about a fourteen hour flight though is that
you run out of excuses not to have a long Bible study pretty quickly. I cracked the good word open and lost myself
in it for several hours and it was greatly refreshing, with the occasional
opportunity to just turn my head and soak in the northern boundaries of Canada
for a great visual of virtually uninhabited mountains and seas. I spent a long
time in prayer as well, preparing my heart for a world unlike any I had ever
experienced before and the trials that were sure to come. My greatest concern, especially once the food
poisoning set in, was that I simply wasn’t going to thrive at all on the
trip. I’m not what most describe as a
tough individual. I’m an officer worker
who doesn’t do well in the sun. It’s
very easy for me to become cynical and become displeased with everything around
me.
Obviously, that’s a bad attitude to have when you’re heading
into sweltering heat and humidity where all the bathrooms are sketchy and the
insects are numerous. I spent a lot of
time just asking God to keep my attitude positive even when the circumstances
were hard.
We landed in Dubai, and I got to be a minority for the first
time in my life. I knew that in India my
US dollars would go very far, so I was excited to see if I could pick up some
cheap souvenirs from the airport there.
The answer is no. No I could
not. A little metal tower about the size
of my middle finger was USD $65. So I
gave up on the Dubai souvenir experience quickly.
The next leg of the flying was uneventful. My dinner stayed down, the music still didn’t
have Leavin’ on a Jet Plane, and I watched the aforementioned Civil War. Anxiousness was setting in. I just wanted to get to India.
We left the airport at about 3:30 AM, so I didn’t experience
the mass of humanity right away.
Initially I was surprised how American it felt. The humidity was immediately powerful. The moment we left the airport doors the
sweat started to pour, but I’d experienced that in Miami before. Most people were speaking a different
language than me, but I’d experienced that in Miami before. Virtually every sign was in English, which is
more than Miami can say, and the litter and the filth wasn’t much worse than
Spokane. I knew I was seeing the nice
part of town, but on the initial ride to the hotel, Delhi just felt like Miami
without skyscrapers.
The hotel itself is a different feel. The humidity outside is rough, but when you
enter a building in an area without AC, it’s even worse. When I stepped into the hotel lobby, my
glasses fogged over. That’s not a joke,
it literally happened. After a full day
there, I still struggle when I’m in the hallways and lobby. The air is thick, and it smells slightly of
smoked bacon, although I’ve yet to see any actual bacon.
There was no real agenda for our first day there, the
programs we were helping with started a day later, so we spent the first day
sightseeing. Once you get out after
sunlight, the mass of people hits you in full effect. There is no stretch of road, shoulder, or
sidewalk not filled. Bikes, scooters,
foot traffic, cars, buses, they all just wander wherever they can find room to
move. We drove for an hour straight and
never even hit the bad side of town, and I never saw a gap that people didn’t
fill.
The driving is as crazy as people describe it, but if I’m
being honest, I absolutely love it.
People use their horns non-stop, not as aggression but to communicate to
other vehicles and pedestrians. Every
vehicle just switches lanes, swerves between them, or just drives around the
side whenever they feel like it. I’m not
sure the cars even have turn signals, and you know what? It works better than American traffic. For nearly eight hours we drove around like
this, I saw no accidents and traffic never stopped. 25 million people with virtually no traffic
regulations get around better this way than 500,000 do on the freeway in Spokane.
Truly, it’s one of the most beautiful art forms I have ever
seen. The way they move and flow through
the maze of machinery is far beyond anything I can ever imagine doing, it’s
simply humans trusting in others to drive and walk attentively, doing whatever
is needed to move forward. There is a
cultural lesson to be learned in that, people looking out for everyone is
actually making it possible for everyone to actually get where they are going. I tried to take videos, but truly no little
sample taken from inside a car can come close to doing the experience justice.
My favorite sight of the day though wasn’t the driving, the
people, or any temples. It was the
single sign I saw that said “no parking.”
Directly in front of it was not one, but two full rows of cars parked so
tightly, that it remains a mystery to me how the cars in that first row ever
expect to actually leave. I have yet to
see a tow truck, so how this issue is even attempted to be handled is beyond my
reasoning.
Other day one observations include:
- · Four people riding on a single moped, with no helmets, and the kid on the back going no hands just to be a boss.
- · A bus of young people staring at our van extensively, obviously because we’re a bunch of white people.
- · The Bah’ai temple
- · A “12th century city” kept intact as a tourist destination.
- · Our taxi driver had two thumbs on his left hand.
- · Being in the market is exhausting. Every price is for barter and the street vendors follow you around constantly. One man trying to sell a wooden cobra, I probably told no 25 times.
- · Even though my phone is set to Delhi time, it still just functions on Spokane time, so my alarm went off 12 ½ hours late.
- · The poverty is not visible in the main part of town. I saw one or two clearly lived in shacks, but for the most part, the slums seem separate from the main town.
- · There are homeless dogs just wandering everywhere and the animal lover in me really had a hard time with it. They wander through traffic the same as everything else.
- · The ants are enormous and I want nothing to do with them.
- · I really love curry and butter chicken.
- · The American dollar doesn’t go quite as far when you have expensive taste.
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