Back in the USA

I’ve decided that I am spoiled. I was never so excited to see my hotel room at the Newark Airport Saturday night with a big fluffy bed, soft pillows, thick towels, and and ice in my drink. We had pizza delivered to our room without pointing. It was a big step for us! (I didn’t realize until we got back to the US what a stress the language barrier had been.) The time change coming west has been a blessing. I forced myself to stay awake on the flight from Moscow to NY so I could sleep at night by watching the movie Grown-Ups three times on the plane. (It was the only one in English, without subtitles, and no blood or guts.)We got home last night about 30 minutes before our girls' Christmas program. It was so good to see them! I couldn't believe how much I missed them. Annsley kept telling me I looked so tall!

As I'm keeping the blog also as a memoir, the next few entries will be covering our various experiences on our trip. Today's entry covers flying. (Sorry it's so long...)

The Krasnoyarsk Airport is rather interesting—more like primitive. I would never venture there in a thousand years without our translator. Unlike the Moscow Airport there was no English here. The second you walk in the door, you put your luggage through a giant x-ray machine. We had a challenge getting our boarding passes as the ticket lady was new and was having trouble getting our bags checked all the way to New York. At one point she actually left her computer and was gone 5 minutes, I suppose talking to a supervisor. I could tell our translator was a bit irritated, and although I knew we weren’t in any real trouble as she wasn’t talking loudly or fast (something I noticed that Russians do when they are upset), Doug and I both got the wigs about being delayed. After soliciting the help of no less than 4 people, 30 minutes later we finally had our passes. The Russians behind us were not happy; in fact, by the time we got finished, no one was behind us. Translators cannot go through security with you, so she told us what to do and watched through the door until we got our shoes back on. They were already boarding when we got to the gate, and again we got on the shuttle bus to go to the airplane. It was absolutely freezing. It was already -27 and combined with the wind chill and not wearing my gloves, I thought fingers were going to fall off. They only let 6 or so people on the stairs at a time. Russians do not get in a nice line; it’s more like a herd of cattle going through a gate.

We were in the international part of SVO airport on the way back home, and it had a few more “comforts” than the domestic part of our terminal although it was all nice.We gravitated to TGI Fridays--finally something we recognized in nearly a week! SVO had recently been renovated, and the part we were in had just been finished earlier this year. And most importantly, all the signs were in Russian as well as English, so we were able to navigate it fairly easily.

Security was interesting. The security workers were dressed in ties or skirts and heels—very formal. The airports provide everyone with the little blue booties (the same ones we had to wear at the orphanage), and it is very orderly and quiet—totally opposite of what I would consider the security at US airports. There are plenty of chairs available for you to put your shoes back on—novel idea! When you get off the airplane at SVO (Moscow Airport), you have to go through passport control—one a time—it is not like in the US where you go as family. The guy takes your passport, scans it and your visa, stares really good at you, and then pushes the buzzer for you to open the door to the free world. I was totally surprised about customs. On the flight to Moscow, there were quite a few Americans on the plane. We, being the quick thinkers we are, quickly made friends with one of them. His passport was one of those which had to have extra pages added to it—we chose well! At the baggage claim he pointed to the customs doors for us. We walked through the customs area, ran our bags through the security system, and didn’t say a thing to anyone. There were a few military looking people, but nobody said anything. On the way back home, we walked through the customs area and nobody was there—nada--but we did have to show our passports to 4 different people before we got on the plane. Security was tight to say the least.

As far as Aeroflot goes, I was really impressed. In fact, the international flights were on the nicest airplanes I had ever been on. The flight attendants were like a throw back to the 1970s. The women had skirts and those cute little hats; the men attendants all wore coats and ties. The food was rather awesome as well. It was still airplane food, but it was really really good for airplane food. I think they served salmon at every meal ; I didn’t eat it but Doug had mine, so he was a happy camper. Everybody we encountered with regard to Aeroflot were really nice and most at the ticket counters in New York and Moscow spoke English. I slept most of the way from New York to Moscow and from Moscow to Kras. I missed 2 of the three meals, but if given a choice, I always take sleep over food. Doug is the opposite. He was telling me that I missed the party on the flight to Krasnoyarsk. The Russian kick boxing team was on that 5 hour flight, and they were having a celebration and passing the whiskey/vodka bottles around.

Some more observations:

A lot of the Russians shrink wrap (Saran wrap) their luggage. For only 250 Rubles we could too. Not quite sure the reasoning behind it, but they had a kiosk set up in the airport with a little guy who would cut out the handles for the passenger.

Russians do not talk in public. The airports and planes were all amazingly quiet.

The Russians enjoy each other's company at the table. Nobody ever seemed to be in a hurry and would sit at a table for a long time. The waiter was never in a hurry to bring us the check--we usually had to ask for it because we were about to fall asleep in our water. Did I mention the jet lag???