New travel stories
April 9th, 2010 by Conrad Stoltz
Airport bed from a previous trip. Cant remember where.
On my recent 35hr trip from Roodewalshoek Farm, South Africa, to Reno Nevada:
4hr drive to the airport with my dad. We seriously considered going on his motorbike,(see previous post) as I have little luggage this time. Fortunately we didnt as it POURED with rain most of the way.
On the 16hr leg from Johannesburg to Washington I sat next to a Brigadier General who is stationed at the SA consulate in Washington. During the Apartheid years he was a Freedom fighter in exile, during which time he was trained in East Germany and basically fought the apartheid ruled SA Defense force. (mostly underground fighting- he was smuggled through the border in garbage trucks, infiltrated the mining hostels etc) Now he is the Brig General of the army he fought against! Thats the speed at which change in South Africa happens! A really cool man- we had some great discussions, including the worrying developments surrounding the murder of farmers and in particular the very worrying racial tension surrounding the recent murder of AWB right wing leader and farmer Eugene Terreblanche.
He still trains to stay in shape like he learnt in East Germany, but I did manage to give him a few training tips…
On the 3 h30 leg from Washington to Denver I sat next to a retired F14 fighter pilot, on his way to a job interview.(He was later involved in the Raptor drone programme) Some seriously interesting stories there: When remote controlled Raptors were still a novelty, (and unarmed) the Iraqi MiGs were constantly attacking them, the 1st armed Raptor was sent up on 17 Dec 2002 and engaged in a dog fight with a MiG. It fired 3 missiles at the MiG, (but they honed in on the MiGs incoming missiles instead) in the end the MiG managed to shoot the Raptor down. Soon thereafter the Iraqis gave up the air fight and buried all their fighter planes in the sand at the end of the runway…
So on the last 1h30 leg from Denver to Reno, I sat next to a fat guy reading a cheesy novel. He insisted on taking the whole arm rest, I tried to diplomatically nudge a little spot for my elbow so I could type on the laptop (catching up on admin) but to no avail- he obviously wasnt going to do “halfsies” or the “20 min you/ 20 min me” thing, but then I finally caught on: With a stomach like THAT, you HAVE to take up both arm rests, even if you DO tuck your elbows in. I think air travellers should be weighed WITH their luggage. Lets start a Face Book Group: 1000 People for Air Travellers Should Be Weighed With Luggage and measured in cubic inches (or cm)…
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April 9th, 2010 at 10:42 pm
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