Oh the horror!

Oh the horror!, originally uploaded by ericdues.

I am sitting here in the Moscow airport (terminal 1 pictured above), which has the same name as the one I arrived late into, but Terminal 1 is actually a 20 minute bus ride away and only for domestic flights. So... I needed to go here, because even though I am flying to a different country (one that has had icey relations with Russia lately too) my flight departs from here.

I was well read on the subject, and even went to the correct desk to ask about this. They then looked at my ticket, with what I can only describe as a cross between astonishment and confusion, and directed me to go to customs (and I questioned their answer, but got the same response). After my 35 minute wait in line at customs, it took me 10 minutes to explain to a non-English speaking customs agent that I had arrived late from New York and was attempting to get on a different flight to Minsk that night. It was a very comedic and frustrating experience for both if us and everyone else that could see or hear us. She then took my customs form that I had filled out for Belarus and stamped my Russian visa... That detail could bust this whole trip, and I may be flying across Russia and into Mongolia. Now comes the 45 minute process of getting on a new flight to Minsk. First I was getting propositioned by a taxi driver... "Good deal...don't miss flight $100" ... in later talks with some random chick, it happens that the cab fare should be about $3 max. After that the process went something like this: - To the information booth that does not quite live up to its name - Walk around aimelessly trying to understand the instructions I was just given. - Take an elevator to floor 6 "airline offices"... Only to find some chick smoking a cigarette at the Lufstansa office that informed me that I should go to the Aeroflot ticket windows on floor 2 (which is where I started before the non-information booth) - Then, after a 10 minute wait due to the ticket lady being out for a few smokes, she informed me to go to an office in the opposite corner of that floor. - I walked by this place earlier, it is basically a small office cubicle in a dirty dark corner of the airport. One small sign had a number on it that I recognized the ticket lady said earlier... So I proceeded to wait in that line. - When it was my turn, I gave my ticket to an obviously unhappy man who, after 10 minutes of bickering with his co-worker, left... motioning for me to follow him. He had some sort of magic form in his hand... it took him a long time to fill out the little information on it. - We arrived at the ticket window I mentioned earlier, he slapped the desk three times after barging to the front of the line, and out came a ticket lady. Since the person who was at the front of the line was an Aeroflot employee, he gave her my form and old ticket and I think mumbled "business to Minsk". - After another 10 minutes a combination of 3 people gave me what I believe at this time is a ticket (it looks nothing like a ticket I have ever see) - I then proceeded to the Aeroflot transfer desk and got instruction and an irrelevant boarding pass for the bus from the young women working at the desk; they were obviously getting amusement out of my extreme degree if ineptitude. Now I have another 6 hour wait between flights and I will arrive in Minsk about 8 hours later than expected. Thankfully, due to the immense power and coolness of the iPhone I was able to confirm my hotel and a slightly more expensive transfer ($50 instead of $40... But now I avoid the hassle of bargaining with a cabbie at midnight in Minsk... The standard fare us $40) to the hotel via a series of 4 text messages. I also meet and talked with some Russian diplomat on the flight who had one that he uses while in the States... he is obviously cool.

It was supposed to be about 24 hours to Minsk(with all of the waiting) but it is now approaching 35. Now my thoughts are solely on my Russian visa. I am going to (hopefully) be able to stay in Minsk an extra day or two and try to pay some dumb amount of money for 24 hour visa processing of a new Russian visa. If that is not possible I may end up skipping straight to Finland and see off it is possible there. This messed up visa situation is pretty much a worst case scenaro, because it could cause me to miss Russia all together, which be a pretty un-authentic trans-Siberian trip. This next week is critical. I will likely send many updates at the same time, but I will be creating the next one as a new entery, so I can see how random and misguided my thought processes were through all of this. I will likely type my next update after I arrive in my hotel in Minsk... Or wherever I end up in the next 12 hours! I will never understand why I insist upon being a traveller, since nothing ever goes smoothly for me when I do it. But, typing all of this has both occupied my time and allowed me to see the humor in all of this. I often said that I expect there to be problems during this trip, and that is ok, because this trip is about the experience of really traveling outside your comfort zone; the destinations are just a way of quantifying the experience. - The Dues