false start

After my first full day in Salzburg, Austria, I've realized that my spring break is absolutely turning out to be pretty fantastic, despite a very strange and potentially ominous beginning.  We've done the obligatory Sound of Music stops and Mozart-themed things and visited a really great brewery that was playing live Olympic coverage.  Normally, I wouldn't have considered the Olympics worth mentioning in this context but we happened to be in the same room as as inebriated Austrian football team while we watched two Austrian skiers take first and second place in the Mens Slalom.

The spoils of our brewery tour: gross pilsner, chocolate stout, and grapefruit shandy.

Let's back up to the aforementioned ominous start, though- that's the real point of this post.  Shallow pockets and poor planning landed us with a 6:20 am flight out of London Stansted, which is about an hour out of the city.  Naturally, there is no public transportation at 3:15 in the morning, so we arranged for a cab to pick us up from our homestay.  We chose to just not go to sleep that night, so we were running pretty low on energy when all of the phones in the house (which are so more shrill than phones in America, I swear) rang.  We were told that our cab was waiting outside, but ended up waiting in the middle of an eerily deserted Leopold Road for about fifteen minutes, listening to a fox fight.  London has a problem with urban foxes for some reason.  They sound terrifying, like a woman screaming- but I guess that means that I know what the fox says. . .

When our cab finally showed up, the driver leapt out of the van with waaaay too much energy for that time of night, chattering away in some sort of Middle Eastern accent about the GPS taking him to the wrong house.  After we got all settled in, he took off.  And I mean really took off.  The man drove like there was a fleet of gun toting gang members chasing us through the deserted suburban streets.  He also used the shuffling-your-hands-around-the-wheel method of steering, rather than the usual, safer looking cross-one-hand-over-the-other way.  I usually associate the shuffling thing with elderly drivers, but now that I've witnessed two different cab drivers do that, I'm wondering if maybe it's a European thing.  Perhaps my grandmother was actually a very chic driver.  Suddenly, the driver got into a bit of an argument with the GPS.  In response to its directions he said, "Turn right? Can't turn right, turn left, turn right?? This eez joke!!" before promptly cranking the van around in the fastest U-turn I've ever experienced.  I don't mean to make him sound horrible-he was really friendly.  A bit frightening behind the wheel, but pretty entertaining overall.  We drove mostly in silence, except for the scratchy radio broadcast of Jason Derulo and 2 Chainz's love ballad "Talk Dirty To Me" playing in the background.

We got to the airport with the proper two hours to spare before our international flight.  Unfortunately, one of my friends had forgotten to print out her boarding pass and the airline we were with charges 70 pounds if you need to get it from their desk.  We found computers and a printer, but they both charged for their use and came with very little direction.  After spending about 45 minutes battling with the stupid computers, we finally headed toward security.  Then, when she tried to scan the bar code on it to get through the gates, no dice.  As Danielle and I were swept further away into the security crowds, we watched helplessly as Hannah was led in the opposite direction.  Fabulous.

I was still thinking about Hannah as I robotically placed all of my belongings into plastic bins and walked through the security arch.  Of course, the alarm went off.  There was the usual pat down from a miserable security guard, then I went through the arch once more.  Again, the alarm screamed.  COOL.  Someone took my shoes before I was felt up a second time.  Then, the woman said the words that every traveller is simply dying to hear.  "We're going to have to do a private."  Without any further explanation, she turned away and proceeded to help four more people through security, leaving me confused and barefoot.  When her superior finally showed up, she ordered me to put my shoes on, to which I replied "You took my shoes," with just a little bit of snark.  She stared as if she was expecting me to make a run for it, then found my shoes and dropped them in front of me.  I was led to a windowless closet of a room, passing a bewildered Danielle on the way, where they did the exact same thing they had already done outside, just five more times.  The minutes until our boarding time were rapidly dwindling.  Neither of the women made eye contact with me once and I was barely addressed at all until I had to sign their form.  Then, they opened the door and left without another word.  I wonder if they're always that pleasant.

When we finally arrived at our gate just in time, I was suddenly overcome by the absurdity of the previous three hours.  And I began to laugh.  The uncontrollable, hysterical sort of laughter; the kind that makes strangers stare and wonder where your handler went.  I suddenly realized how perfect our cab driver had been and turned to Danielle to repeat his wise and prophetic words.

THIS EEZ JOKE.