traveldiary.stracke.us

After our Christmas hiatus at home and my back surgery last week,we are finally going back to Europe with the help of United Airways.
Yesterday we got up at 3:30 AM and our plane leaves at 6:15 from Albany Int. Airport. ( Nobody knows why it is an international airport, there is no customs check there.) It is so cold in Albany(about F 10° below zero) , that the stewardess can not close the door of our Embraer 145 jet . The First Officer comes out of the cockpit and manages to slam the door shut. I am probably not the only passenger on board who hopes that the door will not open during the flight.
Our next flight from Washington IAD to London Heathrow is on an almost empty Boeing 767 and I took 2 two- hour naps stretching out my back, laying across an empty row. In between, I watched the movie ” The Forgotten,” which was pretty good.
I am very happy to report that my back surgery, performed by Dr. Jho in Pittsburgh, has been a great success and I am walking without pain or numbness in my right leg. I hope to keep it this way throughout this journey.
The surgery was on January 20th and we flew home from Pittsburgh the next morning.
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India, like many countries, requires a visa to visit its shores. So, about a week ago, I went on the internet to research the hows of obtaining one. We had 2 choices, we could either get it in person at an Indian Consulate or we could get it through the mail. One should probably opt to get it by mail since it would be more convenient, except for a small point that the consulate made on their website, which states that it was not responsible for any passports lost in the mail. I could only imagine the hassle of acquiring a new passport in a short period of time. NYC, the closest consulate site, is a nice place to visit, thus we opted for the in-person route. Yesterday we embarked on the 2 and 1/2 hour train journey to the big city. The weather was dreary and as we came upon the various bridges along the Huson River, only the pylons of the massive structures were visible. They were jutting out of the icy waters, but the actual bridge spans were shrouded in fog, giving the whole scene a twilight zone appearance. Upon arrival in the Big Apple, we took a quick cab to the Indian Consulate, where we were horded into a basement room, which can only be described as a fire marshall’s nightmare – a fire trap. The approx 14′x16′ room had one small exit for the 150+ people, all waiting to get a visa, the entry ticket to India. On the way in, the security guard pointed us to a ticket machine, where we pulled a number which gave us an indication of when we could expect to be waited upon. According to the numerals, we had close to 70 people in front of us:mad: There were 4 customer windows but only 2 people working. This could not be good!
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