Lisbon and an Absolutely Mad Dash Through JFK
Friday, June 30th, Day 57, 16:00 - My flight wouldn't be until 23:40. I had paid for late check out so I had the room until 16:00, after that I was on my laptop in the hotel lobby trying to get a Medium post written before the weekly round up of the Globetrotters publication get posted sometime on the weekend. At 18:24 Nadia showed up to see me -- She wanted to see me today but Stevens who had just been over to interview is her ex so she had been trying to avoid being over at the same time. So we relocated to sitting by the pool, where she mostly watched tiktok videos while I tried to make conversation. She's a bit addicted I think.
20:30 Nadia went out to catch a yellow-yellow home and I got a free ride from the hotel airport shuttle to the airport. Got to the gate without incident. Worked on the medium story while I waited for the flight. There were only less than a dozen flight plus about 20 young men in the uniform of the Real Sociedad soccer team. I'm a bit mystified because they all looked West African but wikipedia says most of the players of said team are Basque?
Despite the small number of us boarding, the flight was already fairly full of people from its origin in Sao Tome. Makes sense as it's a Portugal-bound Air Portugal (TAP) flight and the island of Sao Tome is one of the former Portuguese African colonies. Well its not an "African colony" in the normal sense of local people coming under the control of the colonial power, Sao Tome was actually uninhabited when the Portuguese founded their colony there. But nevertheless it ended up with a substantial African population due to its use as a slave transshipment hub ("From 1519 to 1540, the island was the center of the slave trade between Elmina and the Niger Delta" ... "Prior to 1580, the island accounted for 75 percent of Brazil's imports, mainly slaves. The slave trade remained a cornerstone of São Tomé's economy until after 1600." -wikipedia). I didn't know all this at the time but I was a bit surprised that the Portugal-bound Sao Tomeans looked more Portuguese than West African.
The direct line flight From Accra to Lisbon would be north by northwest but we actually flew northeast at first to make a big detour around the east side of Mali. I'm curious what will happen to the Wagner Empire's puppet regimes in Mali, CAR and Sudan now that Wagner is being deflated by Russia.
Mostly slept on this flight. I think I was given an option for chicken or ravioli for dinner and had the ravioli.
I had a ten hour layover in Lisbon, during which my checked luggage was checked right through and I could have just proceeded directly to the gate and cooled my heels there, but it was my intention to go out and see Lisbon! I tried to use my German passport (for the first time!) to enter Portugal but it wouldn't scan on the electronic scanner for some reason, so I entered on my US passport.
Metro (subway) was directly connected to the airport, just a flight of stairs down from the arrivals area. Easy-to-use straightforward ticket vending machine gave me an all-day pass for €6.50 (from my recollection, may be off by an insignificant amount). Road the subway half an hour to the city center. The subway and city streets I emerged on to felt strangely deserted, apparently Lisbonians don't really emerge on Saturdays before 10am. I ordered a croissant and "a coffee" at a cafe by where I'd emerged from the subway. Croissant wasn't as good as French ones, but the coffee I found to be a small shot of strong espresso served in a little shot-glass sized cup. I recognized this as an artifact of Brazilian culture in my memory, it looked like a cafezinho!
I found I was just beside the "Gulbenkian Park," which I explored and it turned out to be a very beautiful sort of cubist Japanese Garden covering 19 acres around a pond and anchored on the Gulbenkian Museum. Walking the paths (of square concrete pads) surrounded by stands of bamboo, crossing a little bridge over a babbling brook, was very peaceful after the flight. I tried to enter the museum at around 09:30 but the security guard by the door in a suit politely stopped me and said, in English, with a wink, that it opened at 10:00. There were some other things I wanted to do such as tour the Castelo Sao Jorge but figured be time for that after, so I toodled around the park till 10:00. At 10:00 all the inhabitants of Lisbon seemed to emerge.
Museum admission around €10. I had been under the misapprehension that it would be a museum of modern art but apparently its a museum of the historical collection of Mr Calouste Gulbenkian, which is "one of the largest collections in Europe." The first gallery being ancient Egyptian artifacts I was rather asking myself why I was spending my time in Lisbon looking at someone's collection of Egyptian stuff but then we got to the European art and I felt like I was back on track for appropriate cultural edification. Saw many original Rembrants, Monets, Renoir's etc etc other beautiful paintings and art.
From there I took the subway down to the waterfront where I found what must be tourist ground zero, the cobbled streets swarming with tourists and hawkers. A grand arch, an immense statue on a pedestal stuff like that. My phone fortunately was working, on a $10-a-day plan for foreing roaming with my Australian telecom, which is a good deal for a day or two. And I had a friend I wanted to catch up with in Lisbon so having a working phone was critical to making that possible. My friend Sharon is a Namibian i had actually met on Tinder 6 or 7 years ago, before I met Cristina obviously. We had remained friends but never met up. Now she's in Lisbon with her fiance. We met at an indoor farmers market a few blocks from the tourist center ("Time Out Market"), and then found a little Portuguese restaurant, where I had "black grilled pork" or some such (not very black), which was delicious. And sangria!
While we were sitting there talking her lovely fiance (Italian phone app developer -- she's in textiles and he's in text-iles) asked me when I had to go back to the airport and I airily said "well my flight is at 5:10 so maybe 2:00," and I was still thinking about seeing the castle but he pointed out it was already 14:20! Yikes! Time flies when you're having fun! So we settled the bill and began hurrying to the nearest subway. But along the way we briefly ducked into a little place that specialized in Lisbon's famous little pastry the pastel de nata, and the accompanying ginjinha liqueur, which I was told is best taken from a chocolate cup one then eats but I had a shot of it from a normal glass with my pastel. Lisboa goals knocked out!
Got to airport around 15:40, hour and a half till flight. Long line for "non-EU passports" at passport control but wait I've got this! Used my German passport to cruise right on through the "EU Passports" line. Was still feeling stressed despite having an hour till the flight, since the flight was listed as "final call" on the departures board. Rushed to the gate which was seemingly the furthest one in the airport. Joked with my parents (on FB messenger) that "this is just a warm up for JFK" if I had had any idea! (I had two hours between my arrival (20:00) in JFK and outgoing flight (22:00), which I was already stressed about). Flight was delayed over 40 minutes departing, which further stressed me out about my JFK connection.
Flight from Lisbon to JFK, also via Air Portugal, six hours, unremarkable. Being daytime I didn't sleep much. Watched Bladerunner 2049 (not bad but I wouldn't quite say it changed my life, maybe B+) and The Great Gatsby (B+ as well. I had read the book in high school but forgotten all but the most general outline of the plot. Him not seeing his love for five years made me think of Cristina and miss her, though if she married someone else I like to think I wouldn't proceed to stalk her over it). Chicken cassarole sort of thing for dinner, typical airplane food.
We touched down right "on time" at 20:00 which was our scheduled arrival time, but of course we were actually supposed to be at the gate at that time, and we actually got to the gate 48 minutes later. Ran to passport control to try to get ahead of as many of my co-passengers as possible. Was still in passport control as 21:00 rolled past. Since my continuing flight on JetBlue was a separate ticket I'd have to check in for it which presumably would have to be an hour before the flight. Finally got through passport control (offiical only briefly looked at me and the passport before waiving me through, all while carrying on a conversation with his coworker in Spanish). By the time no more bags were coming down our baggage carousel. Walked around it several times in the opposite direction from what the bags were traveling but didn't see my bag. at 21:20 I rushed off to submit a lost luggage report, came back to see if it had maybe arrived while I was filing the report but it hadn't, exited baggage claim. In the past There's been another 10-30 minute delay to talk to biosecurity while leaving baggage claim but this time there was no sign of them, not even a declaration form to be signed about it.
Found I was in Terminal 1 and had to get to Terminial 5. The inter-terminal airtrain is currently not servicing Terminal 1 so had to wait for an interterminal bus. 21:36 After waiting 5-10 minutes an employee told me if I was really in that much of a hurry I should take a taxi. When I walked over to where the taxis were the bus came and went, these taxis were all already taking passengers. Came back to the bus stop just as the bus to terminal 5 was leaving ::AUGH!:: A bus to Terminal 4 then came and I was suggested to get on it and get the airtrain from there to terminal five. Arriving at the Terminal 4 airtrain station a train was just boarding but they go two directions and while I spent 30 seconds trying to determine if it was going the right way the doors closed and it left. No matter there'd be another one in a moment right? No it took fully ten minutes for another train to come, while I was dying inside. Meanwhile in communication with my parents we were already lookign at other options and there was no other flight this evening, it was looking like the next best option if I didn't catch this flight was a flight tomorrow afternoon. I had only scheduled two days in Rochester New York with my dad's side of the family and didn't fancy wasting half of it in a New York City hotel. On the plus side I'd been notified that the flight had been delayed 15 minutes, and also now that I didn't have checked luggage, I had done the online check in and so, so long as I got to the gate 15 minutes or so before the flight I could probably still get on it!
Got to the Terminal 5 security lines just after 22:00, wasn't sure they'd let me through showing a boarding past for a flight that should have already departed but they did. Only a handful of people ahead of me in line. Ran to the gate ... got there at 22:17, there was no plane there and it was listed as having departed at 22:16. Obviously if I'd been there at 22:15 I still would have missed it. But if I had caught that first airtrain I might have, and/or caught the original bus direct to Terminal 5, or otherwise picked up a few minutes here or there somehow. And certainly if my flight hadn't been 48 minutes late!!
I'd been corresponding with my parents on facebook messenger, giving them updates (from which I was able to get the exact times mentioned above). They suggested I talk to the jetblue staff about my options, which I almost didn't do at all because I didn't anticipate they'd do anything for me, but I was walking right past their check in kiosks when dad suggested I did so, so I went up to them. Much to my surprise without hesitation they said it was their policy to put me on the next available flight at no cost to me (!!!). Last time I missed a flight, in Europe, I had to buy a whole new flight for $600! Unfortunately the next available flight was not until the same flight 24 hours later! BUT dad had noticed there was a flight with open seats to Buffalo the next morning at 06:30, which is only an hour from Rochester. I inquired about this, they said yes they could do that for a $75 airport change fee. So we did so. She asked if I had any checked luggage and I said no as I didn't expect my luggage to have returned to me so soon.
Then (23:08) as I was back on the airtrain headed to where the hotel shuttles go (dad had booked me a hotel, it really took a load of stress off my shoulders his assistance during this) I got a call, my luggage had been found! Could I return to Terminal 1 to get it? Sigh yes I suppose. Terminal 1 recall is the only tediously connected to the others. Got there and got my luggage by 23:37. I'd been blaming Air Portugal and assuming it was still in Portugal but it turns out a luggage conveyor jammed and my luggage as well as at least a dozen other people's from my flight had all been on the jammed conveyor up out of our sight. I thought abut going back to JetBlue to put my checked luggage back on the ticket but of course it takes half an hour to get there so resolved to do it in the morning.
By now the hotel shuttles weren't running any more so I got a taxi. Guy said it would be $60, then when we got to the hotel about 10 minutes away told me the bill was $93. I aske about this difference he said it was taxes and gratuity ... though then when I handed him my last $100 he grumbled saying "the gratuity should be 20% but I guess I'll take $7" and took the whole 100. Meanwhile compare this to several times in West Africa I hired a car and driver all day for less than that!
As midnight ticked over I was waiting in line to check in -- there was a line of half a dozen people in front of me and as many still in line by the time I got to the front. The one receptionist seemed frazzled and overwhelmed but was admirably powering through it. As I'd later learn the transportation infrastructure in the whole region was really stretched the limit this evening, all kinds of flights, trains, car rentals, accommodations all booked out. Finally got to the room and got to bed at 24:13.
July 1st - 03:00 As always when I'm getting very little sleep the problem is exacerbated by waking up in the night being convinced my alarm has just gone off and its time to get up before looking at hte time and realizing no that was just a well nigh hallucinatory dream.
04:00 alarm goes off for real. Downstairs by 04:30 for the earliest hotel shuttle at 05:00. Had to wait in a short line to talk to the check in people to have the checked luggage I'd already paid for added to my ticket. Because everyone without a problem checks in at the automated kiosks, everyone in this line had some complicated problem so it was short but barely moving. As once AGAIN an hour till my flight came on I was stressed all over again. Checked the luggage, but only when I got to security did I remember I had also originally paid for expedited security and that hadn't transferred to my new ticket, as I longingly watched people go through the very short priority security line from my position in the this-time-very-long normal security line. But got the gate around 06:00 and they hadn't begun boarding yet.
Unremarkable hour long flight to Buffalo. Don't think I've ever flown in there before. Got my luggage without incident and went outside to meet my dad and his brother my uncle Kim, but our subsequent adventures in Rochester will be subject for another entry (:
