So far I noted I have gained:
Most importantly perhaps was meeting Maryna's and family. I like all of them very much. Her parents are wonderful - even better than I expected.
Now I am ready to be home - if only to enjoy expresso, wireless internet access, and mango coladas.
Sitting in the Minsk airport waiting on the plane to be made ready - it is 12 minutes behind now. Thankfully we have a two hour lay-over in Paris - which is barely enough time as far as I'm concerned... the layout of their airport is very strange.
Nervous, nervous,can't concentrate to read anything, in some ways it is easier for me to travel alone. Maryna worries and this impacts my mental calm as well. Traveling with Maryna is nice, however, because the flights go by quickly from the good conversation.
Well if we board the plane right now, the plane will take off exactly an hour late giving us only an hour to find our gate in Paris -- probably not enough time.
The flight finally took off - an hour and a half late putting us in Paris at 6:20, check-in for our NY flight closed at 5:40 pm. So much for the two hour lay-over. The icing on the cake was that both Delta and Bellavia's offices were closed...and so we sit in Charles de Gaulle airport enjoying our company nervously waiting for day break tomorrow and another chance at flying home. The difficult thing is that, of course, we have missed (or will miss by tomorrow morning) our flight from New York to Tulsa. I shudder to think of how much money we have spent on unused airline tickets for this trip, and I burn with anger when I think about the course of this waste - human nature. Each state treating other state's citizens as less than human; should have been expected, predicted and accounted for, but it makes me sick to think that this is the norm for the world and beyond that we have been treated as numbers in a "civilized" nation. My only sincerest hope is that either Delta or Belavia will help us in the morning - I must admit, however, I suspect no special treatment will be given by either.
This situation is the result of cause and effect. A plane, a machine, an inanimate object ceased to function in Minsk, Belarus. Two anxious travelers waited for an hour and a half before Belavia corrected the issue and boarded the plane. The effect was the casual disjunction of the young couple's flight plan. The effect was being told by Air France that they couldn't help us because (1) our being late wasn't their fault and (2) our NY flight was booked through Delta, whose office had closed for the night. The effect is a young, travel weary, couple waiting together in a foreign country wondering what the dawn will bring. Each day is a new day - each day is new. The effect is boredom, mind splitting boredom - the effect is writing, writing, writing - entertainment. The effect is a stream of consciousness, the effect is just this _ this. Now, everything, a flood, a flood, patience, quite (or ambient silent noise, the kind so driven and constant that you can no longer distinguish its presence ). Just this.
