A Room with a View

"How did you like your stay in Portugal?" the cab driver asked us as we headed for the airport. "What did you see here?"
We told him a few things.
"Aaaand what else?" he asked.
We told him some more.
"Aaaand what else?" he continued to ask.
We racked our brains.
"What did you eat?" he wen ont.
"We carefully thought of every "traditional dish" we had eaten,( neglecting to mention the hamburger we had one day.)
"Aaaand, what else did you eat?"
I was now getting a bit concerned that we had not had enough of the traditional food and seen enough traditional sights and traveled enough of the country, but then I remembered I had a glass of Port Wine. Port Wine is very big in Portugal. Very big. I told him I had a glass!
"Aaaand, how did you like it?"
Only by an Act of God did the airport appear on the horizon

Today was a travel day and that means packing. Tossing out. Adding to. Checking into closets and beside the dressers and telling the hotel desk clerk just exactly what we did or did not use in the mini bar in the room. Those mini bars have been in every room on the continent. Every room. I'm surprised the cab driver did not quiz us on what we drank from the mini bar in our room.

 "Aaaand, how did you like your bottled water?"

In the process of departure and arrival we find that we look at different things. I suppose these departures are a metaphor for life and I will spare you the sermon but it is always interesting that the "foreign" neighborhood into which we arrived a few days before, has now become "our" neighborhood. We find ourselves almost saying goodbye to landmarks that were a part of our daily lives.

One of the most difficult things to do is to enter a city at night. Yes, the nightlights give it a bit of a glow but the streets generally look a bit sad. I'll admit that the hotels in which we stay, while being in safe neighborhoods and good and clean are certainly not on the main streets of the city with penthouse views. So, we are usually in residential parts of the city and at night they are a bit more lonely. By day, the communters hurry out of their apartments to the subways and busses. There is plenty of life, just not night life.

In departure from Portugal to France, we find ourselves third in the language line. Every announcement in the airport lounge and in the plane is in Portuguese, then Frence then English. We're glad they even consider adding English, though the announcements are all the same...."Don't smoke on the plane."  "Fasten your seatbelts." "Please do not open the emergency exit door while the plane is in flight."

Portuguese airlines have a lot of rules.

In focusing on the grand picture of this trip, I never got around to considering just what Paris might look like. Yes, I think of Notre Dame Cathedral and the Arc de Triumph and the Eiffel Tower and Maurice Chevalier (doesn't everyone?) but beyond that...blank. I am ready to be amazed and delighted. I probably will be too.

But, first I was amazed that the Airport shuttle service had a guy at the gate with my name on a card and we hopped into the van for the hour long trip through evening Parisian rush hour traffic. And as we headed in from Orly Airport something seemed familiar and when I commented on it to Makaila in jest, we agreed. The freeway outskirts of Paris look like Interstate 270 around Obetz. Granted, Obetz does not have the Eiffel Tower way off in the distance and there is not an off ramp to the Champs Elysee but besides that....in the evening dusk....there were a lot of similarities. I will be seeing Obetz through different eyes whenever I drive around there from now on.

But our driver weaves in and out of dozens and dozens of neighborhoods, crosses the Seine, passes the Opera House and turns down a forlorn looking Parisian street. I figure this must be it. And then it hits me, "I am no longer in Obetz."

We sign in, get our room. We discover it is right across the street from the Eiffel Tower with a balcony view!

The last part was not true. NASA couldn't sight the Eiffel Tower from our hotel. We wander off down the street in search of dinner, not a difficult thing to do with so many people walking and so many restaurants crowding every corner. It is all quite delightful. And then we do what every American does the first few hours upon arriving in Paris.

We head for the nearest Indian Restaurant for a Kingfisher, curry and two orders of cheese nan.

The Sacre-Coeur just up the block from our hotel (and the Indian Restaurant)....really!

We have arrived.

Peace,  Bob