One Night Only

It’s a cold Grolsch. Served perfectly in the Dutch style with a two-finger head brushed off coolly by the bartender. Gold and appropriately perspiring as it exits the cooler tap and begins to sit in my glass. But for all intents and purposes, it’s has no business being in my hand right now.

This is the nicest Holiday Inn on the planet. Okay, I can’t verify that for sure, but the floor-to-vaulted ceiling windows, crisp design and inch-perfect tidiness collaborate to deliver a most delightful first-world-plus, euro-chic vibe.

Outside turns to dusk as the last of the sun paints the horizon. Beautiful burnt browns, tans and yellows fade into a green blue water sky. In my entire life, I’ve never seen the sun set this late. Not by a lot. The clock just struck 10:30 and I’m struck with a palpable sense of possibility. How else could I react to the invitation of daylight well into the throws of night?

A Norwegian engineer told me that his hometown will only see two hours of dark tonight. I can’t even imagine. And to think Latvia is on a similar parallel. He also told me that the windmills so common in the The Netherlands are primarily used to pump water, even out the water table and keep the land dry, even below sea level. Lastly he mentioned that the west coast of Norway exports huge amounts of rock to The Netherlands for dyke construction and other building projects. Movement on this planet never comes without its fun facts.

Nor does it fail to inspire my palate. Curious how getting back to a certain region awakens my desire for flavors I seldom crave in other places. It’s like that jones you might have for barbecue, hush puppies and cole slaw when you enter North Carolina; Or chai in the Pune train station; or a hot dog at Fenway Park. Lets put it this way, I just surfed the Holiday Inn dinner buffet and spent decided against chicken, beef and rice in favor of smoked fish, cured meats and baguette. And cucumbers.

I’ve never had a flight canceled before. Now I’ve had two cancellations on the same trip and I still have two flights to go. This has got to go down as one of the deepest travel scars of my young life. Still, I’m living large in the Holiday Inn Schipol and reminded of the joints I stayed at with my Mom on the epic road trip of 2001 from Rome to Vienna and back (This is the trip where she delivered a master class on Italian Driving and managed to break us out of Ertzberg Station within days of each other. To this day, these events remain as two of the top travel achievements of I’ve had the fortune to witness. I’m going to honor that trip with a second trip to the cured meat bar now.)

Back at my seat, the seemingly everlasting sunset continues backed by a soul/lounge version of Seven Nation Army by the White Stripes. This has got to be the most painful euro-cover I’ve ever heard. Yet, somehow, painful euro-covers always seem to find their place into your life at the right time. Tomorrow I go to Riga and a seven nation army couldn’t hold me back.

I've Been to Canada. Twice. Tonight.

I cleared Canadian immigration twice today. The first thunderstorm of summer cut off the route north of Newark, canceling a flight to Montreal and leaving my Toronto-based jet stranded on the Jersey tarmac. No sweat, right? Just ride it out and hope that it doesn’t turn into an eight-hour runway parking lot. (Over the weekend I heard two separate accounts of this kind of event). Besides, my neighbor was a cute girl from Queens flying to Paris for the first time and I’m headed to Riga tomorrow…

Arriving late in Toronto, I passed through immigration and showed up (with 20 minutes to spare) at the gate for my flight to Heathrow, only to find that the airline cancelled my seat. Seems that they expected my original flight from Newark to arrive at 2am, not at 8pm when I actually touched ground. During my discussion with the gate attendants, they said I could not get on the scheduled flight because I would not be traveling with my bag. So in order to rebook, I had to file back through immigration, retrieve my bag and then check through the airport from the beginning.

Begrudgingly, I took my long journey. I made quick friends with a long lost Aussie who found herself in the same traveling chasm as me, a baggage agent with braces who overwhelmed his annoying half with a well-timed dose of helpfulness, and a customs officer who told me that she loathed AirCanada and had me laughing straight into Canada for the second time in an hour.

I am no systems analyst. Nor do I seek to criticize too much without some expertise in the field or without being part of a solution. That said there must be some sort of loophole in a national immigration system when the same person can check into a country and then check into that country again without raising the slightest of interest.

Weary from a weekend with friends and a late Memorial Day Night, I retrieved my bag (which had until this time been unidentifiably somewhere between the baggage carousel, the bowels of luggage storage and on its way to England). They sent it up individually, though they didn’t announce it in lights like they do the planes (which may have redeemed the whole fiasco entirely), and I lugged it off the carousel. Stumbling back to the ticketing counter, I nearly dropped at the sight of the 30 party line. Instead, I leapt into full-on survival mode and chased a sharp looking agent who seemed to know the trade . He listened to my situation explanation, booked me immediately and sent me through.

Restored, I welcomed the sight of Tim Horton’s next to my flight gate. A place of legend originally introduced to me by my friend Matthew, who had grown to love it during his days north of the border. I welcomed the warm coffee and donuts home as they corrected my sugar balance and gently pushed me to write this piece about my last hours in the Toronto airport.

On a world journey in which I expect to visit almost 15 countries, the first stamp on my passport will be from one I did not expect. O, Canada.

Click on the comic to see how Bob the Angry Flower and rolls at the Canadian border.

New Beginnings

Almost 3 years ago, I left home to chase a dream in India. I thought to document the trip and thought to blog it out, using the same interface I'm using now. Ah, the intention good, the execution not so much. The Road to Delhi and Other Tales faltered out of the starting gate, falling prey to a number of computer glitches, my own naive belief that blogging without a personal computer would be a breeze and internet connections that rivaled turtles and last period trig classes for speed.

Action is Everything seeks new ground. Not as bold in ambition. Not seeking to be the revelation of my first world journey. Instead, exploring. Reflecting. And a love letter to home.
And those I wish to, with me, walk.