The Adventure of travelº

I am obviously sitting in front of a computer as I write this. However, I am writing this from my notes that I took in my little notebook. So, I´ll simply repeat them as they are when I wrote them:

I´m sitting in the 2 engine prop plane having just left Merida enroute to Caracas. The view of the Andes is just spectacular.The airplane took off downwind, because the runway is pretty steeply inclined and the planes take off, understandably, downhill rather than uphill. After taking ff, we made a sharpU-turn and climbing steeply, for20 to 30minutes attempted, successfully, to get up out of the valley in time to clear the mountains at the end. TheAndes are really beautiful, and very dramatic. After 10 minutes of flying and gaining altitude it was impressive to look out the window up and up at Pico Bolivar, towering stall way above us.

I have every confidence that we will clear all themountains. For 2 reasons. First, before we left, there was a large tabernacle in the waiting room dedicated to the Virgin Mary with an electric clandle burning dimly, and a numberof the passengers (thefrequent flyers??) knelt to pray before boarding. Second, the plane has proudly stenciled on it´s nose, Ïmmaculate Conception.With that kind of divine intervention, what can go wrong??

This is the last flight of the day from Merida to Caracas. We arrive in Caracas about 6:30 p.m. Incredibly, LAB Airlines called me in Merida, probably AFTER calling Elsbeth in California,to get my telephone number. They told me the flight will leave Caracas at 5 a.m. instead of 3 a.m. This means I´ll be spending the better part of the night in the Caracas airport.The senora of my house said,¨"Oh, well, just look at it as one more adventure." Howtrue!

-----------------------

Okay, it´s 11 o´clock at night and I feel like I´ve been in this airpoprt forever! I´ve only been here less than 5 hours and I´ve just got 4 hours more to go before I can check in. When I stepped out of the little airplane in Caracas, I realized I had just gone from the fresh mountain air at 5000 feet to sea level. It was hot and humid. Fortunately, the airport terminal is air conditioned.

I´m sitting on a plastic chair in the food court. Most of the fast food places are shutting down for the night. I had the opportunity to dine on Church´s Chicken. I chose that over Subway because the veggies are usually washed in tap water. My chicken sandwich was close to inedible.It also came with lettuce, no doubt washed in tap water, and off color mayonnaise. Unfortunately, I was hungry and ate it. I may pay dearly for it later.

The telephone store and the internet cafe closed about an hour ago. The only other people here are thosewho, like me, are staying in the plastic chairs until 3 a.m.when we can check in for the5 a.m. flight. Half the people are couples. The other half are all men. Most of them are drooped over their tables, their heads in their arms, trying to nap. The fluorescent lighting is bright and skull-penetrating.There is "·background" music, piped in at maximum volume from speakers all over the terminal which are not quite in sync. The affect is one of totally incomprehensible lyrics and cacophonous noise. It is very surreal.

Every hour or so,I take a walk around the terminal. It takes about 5 minutes. The whole terminal is about 100 yeards long. One security gurard nods, smiles and waves at me as I make my circuit. A moment ago he came up to me here in the food courtto tell me that where I´m sitting is right under the air conditioning outlet, and that if I´m cold, I should move 30 feet over to where some other tables are. How nice! I told him I was from the cold mountains of California and that as strange as it seemed I actually liked the cold air.

I´m drinking bottled water.The brand name is "Nevada," produced by the Coca Cola Company. Ah yes, globalization comes full circle! Flight travails, to be continued.