Plans, Plans, Plans

I realize I need to talk about the Swiss part of our Christmas vacation. For whatever reason I'm drawing a blank. Switzerland is clean, gorgeous and has incredible dairy products. Also--my very cool baby brother and his family live there and we love spending time with them! Parry told me once that talking to Christina felt like "talking to a mirror." For Parry, this is a tremendous compliment. We love their kids (only our girls can out-talk Ruby-do) and Abby loves mothering Henry. In fact, we had such a wonderful time that we are having the 1st Christmas Vacation Reunion Tour--London edition in April. Also cool baby sister Julie will be along for the ride, beautiful baby Hannah in tow, and we hope the parental units, Jeff and Marge. We anticipate that there will be many other Christmas Vacation Reunion Tours before our time in Moscow is up. I'm campaigning for Spain/Morocco next April break and we're already talking about Israel for Christmas. Which brings me to the way a Moscow expat stays sane in the winter time: planning. Even for a compulsive list-maker planner like me planning takes on a new dimension during the Russian winter. When weather.com pronounces the forecast as "dreary," when you haven't seen the sun directly overhead for a month and everywhere you look seems to be coated with a layer of sludge and scum, you need to know that at some point, you're going to get out. For me this is especially important because of the rash of headaches I've had. I've been prone to migraines lately with no real logical trigger. When you're in a country that hates you, the weather is lousy, inflation rampant, the financial crisis bottomless and everyone around you, including your kids, are tight-lipped with stress, a migraine is the proverbial pond scum of your days. In fact, I'm writing this, squinting at my laptop because my head feels like an axe is embedded in my scalp and it is two hours too early for bed. I am COUNTING the days until I go to the US. You know things are ridiculous when an endoscopy and a bunch of blood tests are something to look forward to. I want OUT. My daily life has to be very planned. Unlike some expats, my driver is more like a personal taxi service than a personal driver. He is paid a flat fee per month to drive us; we give him a weekly schedule of when he is needed. The rest of the time is his--it is rare to never that I can simply call him in the middle of the day and say "Hey, McDonalds, пожалуйста." This means that I have to know when and where I'm going every day, a week in advance. This is anal retentive even for a control freak like me. A routine makes it easier : Mondays--shopping and/or lunch with Elke; Tuesdays--Anglo-American School Russian class; Fridays--International Women's Club Architecture Group. Sometimes my Indian cooking class breaks up the routine. Sometimes I take the bus and metro to the center for business lunch. And sometimes, I feel like I am a rat in a maze and one more week of planning is going to make me crazy. This is why I like vacations: I can come and go as I please without having to put it on a spreadsheet. I want a spinach salad from the pre-prepared food aisle at Waitrose--grab the Oyster card and head to the nearest Tube station. I want to walk aimlessly or go to a bookstore or window shop--all can be done at my leisure. I love to plan vacations. I spend hours online and reading travel books. I have become an expert on airports, airlines, hotels, public transportation and shopping. I can pack an under 20kg bag in 15 minutes and be out the door at a moment's notice. I don't do that often because I'm usually supervising the packing and document procurement for three children, but I can. Planning to get out is the best escape from living the plan. It's one of those twisted Catch-22 things about being Russia. Someday when I have my own car and the ability to go to Costco and indulge in rampant consumerism at will, I may recall with fondness the odd sort of simplicity that my planned life here has forced upon me. For now, I look forward to the next escape plan.

Thoughts on the new presidency from the girl with a migraine

I don't have a lot of recollections about being punished as a kid. The one memory I do have is of my father answering a tearful apology with, "Talk is cheap, Heather." He essentially said that saying your sorry and making amends--doing the right thing--are two different things. As someone who has at various junctures in her her past dealt in the world of words, I can definitely testify that any competent wordsmith can craft a deft turn of phrase that means absolutely nothing if it isn't backed up with action. I didn't watch the inauguration. I took a test, came down with a migraine headache, tried to read a chapter for my history class and gave up before the festivities were over. What I did read about were the polls portraying buoyant optimism on the part of the American people that President Obama can fix our problems. I saw journalists and commentators tripping over themselves to see who could come up with the most articulate superlative to describe the wonder that is our new president. I was reminded of reality when I read an article about the assassination of a human rights lawyer and his Novaya Gazeta journalist colleague near the Kroptinskaya metro here in Moscow in the last few days. Ah that the world were so simple that saying the right things could fix it. My take on things is decidedly more pragmatic. In an email to a British friend, I wrote, "...if I were less of a cynic, I would allow myself to be swept up in the optimistic tide of the American public and believe that everything will be sunshine, ponies, puppies, rainbows and unicorns now that we have a new president. Alas, I am a cynic and I have spent too many years watching politicians to believe that any politician can ever be a messiah. One can only hope they leave office without breaking all the toys." President Obama is a bright, charismatic, articulate, ambitious individual who has thus far made some shrewd decisions in who he has selected to work with (I think he could have done better than Hillary Clinton at State, but at least she can be a pitbull. Conflict of interest issues over her husband's foundation and library taking money from people like the Saudis makes me nervous. ) If he does try to reach beyond partisanship, avoid the temptation to spend the next four years prosecuting former Bushies to please the extreme Left, and do more than simply increase the size of government and throw money at the problem, he may have a shot at a second term. Absolving American citizens of personal responsibility for their bad spending habits and self-indulgence does not equate to solving problems. We don't need Santa Claus; we need a leader willing to make hard decisions, even if they are unpopular--even if it means people have to suffer the consequences of their choices. President Obama's election is historical but so far, he is symbolic, not substantive. Talk is cheap. Symbols are cheap. In many respects, what his team has excelled at so far is marketing him and selling him to the public. There isn't a lot in his record to justify the accolades that have been heaped on him nor to substantiate the expectations that he can fix all that ails the US. Reality is far more complex than rhetoric. So he said the right things. I can say the right things. Anyone with a good speechwriter can say the right things and say them eloquently. Until his actions show me that he is a man who is willing to deal honestly with the challenges facing our world in a substantive way, I will wait and hope, placing my faith in a merciful God.

My Christmas Vacation...Gay Pareee

I have never been a Francophile. It isn't that I don't appreciate France--particularly French art--but I've never understood what could possibly be so amazing about Paris that people drop everything in their lives to move there, wear berets, live in rat infested garrets and smoke in cafes while discussing Proust. This is, of course, an exaggeration, but I honestly couldn't imagine a city that was more amazing than, the Swiss Alps or the Norwegian fjords or more enchanting than the Cotswolds in England. I am more a Lord of the Rings girl than a Hunchback of Notre Dame girl. That being said, Paris is cool. It has a certain vibe--not to mention its streets being rife with history on every corner--that its hard not to love it. From goose-stepping Nazis to impressionists hawking their wares to generations of backpacking college kids camping out in the Tuilieres gardens--it all feels like it is alive in Paris today, no mater how long ago it happened. Parisians are unapologetic about their history. We all loved the irony of placing a Ferris wheel, more or less, on the spot where Marie Antoinette and her ilk were guillotined. Where else in the world do you put a kiddie ride on the spot of a famous person's death? Most people would have a plaque or a memorial. Not the French. They are shameless about tarting up Versailles with horrid modern art (nowadays, you must look past a plastic rendering of Michael Jackson and Bobo the monkey to take in the King's bedroom). At the same time, the top floor of the Musee Orsay is sacred space. I fell in love anew with VanGogh. What sad, tragic, brilliant painter. Loved the Orsay. Loved the Orangerie. Loved the Eiffel Tour by night. LOVED felafels in the Jewish Quarter. Didn't love the Louvre. I feel guilty for saying that. How dare I not love the Louvre. I love museums. I've queued in line for many museums of lesser status and thoroughly enjoyed everything about those museums. But the Louvre left me a little blitzed. Imagining the opening scenes of the DaVinci Code was probably the most entertaining aspect of the visit. "And that's where Sauniere's body was laid out in the pentagram with all the blood..." The rest of the time I felt like I was fighting for life and limb just to make it up an escalator with my purse, ticket and sanity in tact. My favorite moment was when my niece Ruby, after noting the throng around the "Mona Lisa", proclaimed, "I can't see!" and proceeded to crawl underneath a sea of legs, up beyond the security barrier right to the front where she was gently escorted away from DaVinci's most famous girl. I have been in Disneyland in August and managed easier crowds than the Louvre. Loved Michaelangelo's "Slaves." Loved DaVinci's "Madonna on the Rocks." Loved the Louvre-Rivoli metro stop font. It is the only stop on the Paris metro stop that uses this font. Wish I could find it and use it on my blog. Loved the garishly out of place pyramid over the lobby. In Paris, it makes a strange sort of sense. Won't be going back anytime soon. I'll be saving up my crowd queuing karma for the opening of Harry Potter World at Universal Studios Florida.

What Happened Over Our Christmas Vacation--a story in several parts, not in order...

I'm going to write these entries out of order. I'm just in one of those moods. I'll start off with Sara's story because I think it is more interesting than tales of meltdowns in Finnish grocery stores and complaints about the French ability to queue aren't what I'm in the mood to write about today. And what can you say about Switzerland? Boy, is it clean. Best restroom in the world is at the Gruyere Cheese factory, hands down. No one would ever get Hep A if we took a lesson from the Swiss sanitary habits. That being said, there are points of interest beyond self-cleaning toilets, all night cook-a-thons in Helsinki, being trampled before the Mona Lisa and watching "Australia" at a movie theater on the Champs Elysees. On Sunday, January 4, after a lovely holiday in Switzerland and Paris, we prepared to send Sara back to the US. She's done this flight what, five, six times now? She's flown back and forth between Western Europe, Russia and the US enough times that she can sleepwalk through JFK--this is saying something. The worst part of the journey, typically, is Sheremetyvo Airport. On some surveys, Sheremetyvo nips at the heels of Charles DeGaulle as the worst airport in the world. Let's just say that Heathrow is a welcome change from SVO. The trip started off poorly whenI discovered that the Moscow-Atlanta flight was delayed by 90 minutes. I gave Sara some rubles for a snack, she went through at least three security checks just to get to the gate and then we waved good-bye.I had plenty to do that afternoon. We were joining the Moscow, Russia and Moscow, Russia-West districts on a week long temple trip to Helsinki, Finland. An overnight train to St. Petersburg followed by a day long bus trek was ahead of us. We ate normal food (you never eat normal food on a Russian train), packed our bags and went to our cattle car third class bunk on the Petersburg train. And then we checked the Delta website to see what the status was of Sara's flight. The webpage said: DIVERTED. You expect delayed, in flight, landing, boarding but not DIVERTED. There are only a handful of reasons to divert a plane: mechanical problems, medical emergency, terrorism and inflight disruption. None of those are happy. Especially for a parent crammed into a cramped coffin of a bunk on a Russian train heading off into the bleak, freezing cold expanse of northern Russia. We tried using a calling card to contact anyone we could find in the US. No luck. I tried my brother Peter's cellphone in Geneva--he has Vonage VOIP and could call Delta for us. No answer. We finally sent an email to Parry's brother who had been charged to pick her up in SLC and take her back to university. The long and the short of the email was "FIND HER." And then we waited. All through the long night in the cramped bunk, my ipod noise-reducing headphones crammed in my ears, my Kindle hugged close to my chest so it didn't accidentally fall down the 5 feet from my bunk to the floor. In the morning we discovered that she had been diverted to Newfoundland, the first airport you can touchdown at once you're across the Atlantic. Not a great sign. She was delayed so long she missed her connection in Atlanta. What a wonderful development when your child has an 8AM econ class. The story of what happened on the flight is copypasted into this entry. The bottom line is this: Parry's brother Peter worked a miracle and got Sara back to SLC on Monday morning. The other people on that flight had to wait until Tuesday evening. Her luggage was lost, she hadn't had much sleep but she made it in one piece. We are eternally grateful for Peter helping her out. As a parent, it ranks up there as one of the scarier moments I've had, crossing your fingers that your child isn't on the flight where the suicide bomber has figured out how to mix the Delta lavatory handsoap with the lip balm in his bag to make an explosive device. In some respects the situation is pretty funny and fairly typical if you know what it is like traveling with Russian. That being said, I don't think Sara is that keen on traveling back to Russia any time soon. Perhaps a double major in European Studies isn't what she wants after all :)

Unruly Passenger Forces Emergency Landing Of Delta Flight

Sunday, January 4, 2009 – updated: 9:00 pm EST January 4, 2009 ATLANTA -- A Delta Air Lines flight bound for Atlanta was forced to make an emergency landing Sunday due to an unruly passenger.A Delta representative, who called the incident a security threat, told Channel 2 it happened aboard flight 47. Officials said the plane took off from Moscow and made an emergency landing in the Canadian town of Gander, Newfoundland.Delta said there are about 200 passengers on the Boeing 767.They confirmed the plane was met with Royal Canadian mounted patrol in Gander.Delta didn’t release details Sunday, but said the incident was grave enough to re-route the flight to another country where the problem passenger could be dealt with Sunday.“They are going to get everyone back to Atlanta safely,” said Delta spokesman Susan Elliott. “This is a rare occurrence.”The flight was scheduled to land at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport Sunday night.Copyright 2009 by WSBTV.com. All rights reserved.

Atlanta-bound Delta jet diverted to Canada

Unruly Russian passenger in jail in Newfoundland after being restrained by 8 people

By CHRISTIAN BOONE

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Sunday, January 04, 2009

An unruly passenger so disrupted an international Delta Air Lines flight that the Atlanta-bound plane was diverted to a Canadian airport where authorities took the subject into custody. Flight 47 from Moscow to Atlanta made an unscheduled stop Sunday at Gander International Airport in Newfoundland, and the passenger was removed by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, said Delta spokeswoman Susan Elliott. Canadian authorities identified the passenger as Sergey Kotsur, 39, of Russia. Elliott said the decision to eject the passenger was made by the plane’s captain. She would not release details about Kotsur’s actions. According to a RCMP news release, the plane “was diverted as the result of an intoxicated, unruly male passenger.” The plane was carrying 206 passengers when it departed Moscow earlier Sunday. It landed at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport about 10 p.m., more than four hours behind schedule. Flight 47 passenger Eric Feliciano, waiting for his luggage late Sunday night after clearing customs, said the Russian passenger was sitting ahead of him in coach. He noticed an empty 1.5-liter bottle of Chivas Regal next to the man’s seat. Kotsur allegedly started fighting with his wife and banging on the side of the aircraft. “He was drunk,” said Feliciano, 40, a Tallahassee, Fla. resident who was returning home from vacation.. “I was afraid he was going to try to jump out of the plane or something.” Another passenger, Irakli Bolkvadze, 30, of Moscow, said he watched as crew members assisted by others confronted Kotsur. “The steward said some guy was sick,” and that he had mixed alcohol with “pills,” said Bolkvadze, who was flying to the United States for a vacation. It took eight people — male and female flight attendants and passengers including Feliciano — to hold Kotsur. They tried putting him in plastic wrist binders, but “he broke the restraints a couple of times,” the Florida man said. After police took Kotsur off the plane and put him in a police car, he tried to kick out a window of the vehicle, Feliciano said. He said he came to the crew’s aid because “you do what you need to do when you see a disturbance like that.” Kotsur remains in jail on assault and mischief charges. He is scheduled to appear in Gander Provincial Court on Wednedsday. — Staff writer Ben Smith contributed to this article.