Ryan's flight

In what I hope is the first of many interesting blog entries to come, today I’ll be writing about flying to India. Later, we’ll write about what it’s actually like in India—the food, the traffic, the security, the Florida-like atmosphere of equal parts humidity and warmth. On Friday, I got onto an airplane in Salt Lake City at 11:10AM. I had to pass through security (for those of you keeping track at home, this is trip 1 through security), show my passport and visa, and get on the flight. I arrived in Chicago at 3:15PM (Chicago time), and hurried to meet my father-in-law Doug in the unsecure area; I enjoyed a sub sandwich, something I already find myself sorely missing. That done, it was off to the international terminal, where I passed through security yet again (second time) and got on a flight at 5PM bound for Paris.

Luckily enough, Air France seems to know how to do on-board meals (at least on flights from the States to the EU), so it was a fairly comfortable flight. Air France also serves alcohol free of charge to all on board, including those in coach; between the other 3 people on my row, just under a dozen airline size bottles of wine were consumed. And then, around 8AM Saturday morning, French time, the plane lands. We get an interesting tour of the countryside on a bus (apparently the jetways weren’t working at Charles de Gaulle air port that morning, and everyone was being bussed around) as it delivers us to our gate. We have to hurry to get to our connecting flight. This means yet another trip through security (third time around). Somehow, I managed to set off the metal detector this time around, so it’s time for frisking and wanding. They don’t find anything and I manage to avoid setting off the wand, so I collect all of my various belongings and rush to catch the plane.

By the way, EVERY time I went through security, I had to use up 4 of those bins they hand out—1 for my personal laptop, 1 for my work laptop, 1 for my carry-on backpack, and 1 for my belt, shoes, ring, wallet, passport, pen, and jacket. I’m still trying to figure out what exactly triggered the detector in France, as I was able to pass
through security in Chicago and SLC without any difficulty. My personal laptop, an 11-pound Itronix that is made of magnesium and titanium, drew great interest wherever it went through security, but luckily nobody asked me to disassemble it or anything.

So, off to Bangalore we go. This flight is leaving at 10AM and is scheduled to arrive at just after midnight Sunday morning. The food served on this flight was atrocious. Again, lots of free booze flowing. The flight arrives at Bangalore without incident, and by some miracle all of my luggage made it and the flight was on time. I’ve never been on a flight where both of these things were true
(timeliness and luggage, that is).

Now, the final airport hurdle—we have to clear customs and immigration. This is actually a two-step procedure; prove you have a passport, a valid visa, and that you have a place to stay and that you’re going to be leaving within the terms of your visa; when this is done, your bags get tossed and you’re cleared to leave the airport (fourth time through security).

You step outside the airport into a seething mass of humanity waving signs and honking horns. I was reminded very much of Florida—humid, warm, etc. We find our two contacts here in Bangalore (who were kind enough to wear Decho shirts, thereby making them easily identifiable) and piled into an Indian-made SUV branded “Scorpio” (insert your own Simpsons joke here). Tomorrow, perhaps we’ll cover more on the joys of driving in India. Fortuitously, the streets aren’t particularly full at one in the morning, so the drive to the hotel wasn’t nearly as nail-biting as I expected.

We get to the hotel, where our car is checked for bombs by two very lackadaisical guards (they saw our suitcases in the back, but didn’t open them), complete with those nifty under-the-car mirrors you always see in the movies. After we’re given clearance by the bomb guards, we go to the front door, where there are two more guards manning yet another metal detector. There’s no tray in which to put metallic objects, and they just motion us through the detector, bags and all.

As soon as my carry-on (two laptops, remember) goes through, the detector starts screeching ferociously. My carry-on is subjected to yet another cursory search and I’m subjected to another frisking and wanding (second one, for those of you keeping track at home). In the meantime, we’re rather vehemently expressing to the various porters lounging about that no, we are quite capable of getting our bags up to our rooms. Having to deal with the metal detector is now a daily ritual, though the security is more for appearance’s sake than for actually providing security. The guards don’t have firearms, radios, or batons, so even if someone did walk in with a bomb or gun, there’s not a whole lot they can do about it.

In any case, having checked into my room and being quite tired, I crashed onto my bed and got a good 6 hours worth of sleep. More to come tomorrow!