Sylvia's Journal

Just hours before my departure for Amsterdam I walked into the American Airlines cargo office at Logan and gave the lady at the desk the number that would get me my passport. “Is it a dog?” she asked incredulously, checking off my number on the paper in front of her. “No,” I said, “that would be a spelling error. I am expecting a doc, not a dog, actually a very special document, especially for someone leaving the country in a couple of hours, by plane.”

She returned from the backroom with a large box, the size that tall boots come in. I was starting to get worried, a dog after all? I asked her to unpack my parcel until we got to what I wanted. Inside the big parcel was a smaller parcel and inside that was an envelope – this remained a game of suspense till the very end. Inside the envelope was my passport, the brand new one, with one page-size visa stamp from the embassy of the Bangladesh in Washington. And as some sort of reward for my endurance there was one surprise: it was a stamp for multiple entries, valid until the end of July. I better get myself some more business in Bangladesh.

And with that the adventure ended and I learned once more, as if I don’t already know this, that miracles do happen and whatever you name that benevolent power that exists in the universe, it is looking after me.

Getting my passport was the high point of a long day of preparing for what looked like a trip with all sorts of possible surprises. I had decided to pack light, in case I would be sent back to Dubai, and carry hand luggage only, even though this is a most likely going to be a three-week trip. That way I would not need to worry about checked luggage. Besides, I was not sure what might happen in Dubai with a terminal change in the middle of the night. There were simply too many plane changes for luggage to get lost. Furthermore, I will travel via Bangkok and I remember the airport chaos there a month ago – I am not sure how stable the place is now but I figured that with hand luggage only I could be nimble and respond quickly to last minute changes and other surprises.

Thus the packing became a little more complicated than usual, which is done mostly on automatic pilot. Now I had to decide which of my usual creature comforts to leave behind. It took me a good part of the day to make those decisions, in between other tasks that had to be completed.

Late in the afternoon, while the temperature was dipping far below freezing, we went for a walk with Chicha using the choker collar with the torture spikes because otherwise Tessa and Steve would get mad at us for messing up their dog training routine. It remains painful to watch the dog practically choking itself and making awful guttural sounds. The poor thing just can’t help herself – there are too many squirrels to chase; it’s in her genes. We’re probably doing the routine all wrong, telling her to heel when the choker hurts most – she probably figures that ‘heel’ is something better not done since it is associated with pain. We are not dog people and have no idea how dogs think and we don’t seem to get any wiser. Axel wants to take the whole family to a Petco dog training session so we are all on the same wavelength – sort of like family therapy instead of individual therapy, for the dog as well as the humans.

Axel drove me to the airport and after the passport was reclaimed we celebrated the miracle in the nice restaurant by the security lines of terminal E. It has become a bit of a routine to have a meal there before I board the plane so I can start sleeping right away. Next to us were three Russians drinking hard liquor as if there was no tomorrow. I am glad I was not on their plane.

The plane was only half full; nevertheless I did not sleep much, despite the meditation tapes; when the soft voice would come on after a long silence it would jerk me out of semi-consciousness and ended up having the opposite of its intended effect. We arrived early because of a strong tailwind and then waited 40 minutes for a gate to open up. I walked straight to the humongous new KLM lounge, took a shower and loaded up on good coffee and ‘broodjes met kaas.’ And now I am waiting for the signal to board the plane to Dubai, one I have now taken 3 times in the last two months, as if I have a real estate business there.