Monthly Archives: October 2011

Oct16

My life in an Airport: Day 1

Posted on by
Standard

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

I had been flown back to Sao Paulo airport in Brazil, after loosing my passport prior to going through Immigrations in Buenos Aires. Now, back in Buenos Aires the US Embassy had told me that there was nothing that they could do for me, since I was not technically in Argentina yet (since I hadn’t gone through immigration), and thus I would have to fly back to the United States in order to get a new passport. Thus I had worked out a plan with LAN airlines: they would fly me back to Sao Paulo, and from there I’d be set up with tickets all the way back to Boston. I had given the LAN people my drivers license to prove I was a US citizen, and was sitting around waiting for them to bring me my new boarding passes; they had said it would be about an hour or so before they’d have everything ready for me to move on.

Well… two hours passed, and I heard nothing. Three hours turned into four hours, and I finally got tired of waiting around and went to find the LAN people who I had been talking to. I did find them, and they told me the same things they had told me before: “we’re looking into flights, and need to get confirmation about your citizenship from the US as well as confirmation from Buenos Aires about the full situation. Just give us an hour or so and you’ll be on your way.” Hmm… I’m starting to get a bit skeptical here.

So I called up the US consulate in Sao Paulo, hoping to get some information. The first time I called they were closed, but I was able to work my way through the automated system to get into the “Emergency citizens help line”. Unfortunately this only lead me into a logic-loop, where the menu kept restarting itself. After three iterations I got pissed off and hung up, planning on calling back again later, after dealing with LAN some more. I hunted for the airline people a bit more, but as usual they had an uncanny ability to disapear as soon as I went looking for them… almost Batman-esque in their ability to disappear.

My second attempt at calling the US Consulate met with much more success than my first try, though still not as much as I was hoping for. The Duty Officer was very nice, but unfortunately wasn’t able to offer much in the lines of actual help: Much like in Argentina he couldn’t directly do anything, since I wasn’t technically in Brazil. However, he said that they could send someone over from the Consulate to help me fill out the forms to get a temporary passport; but no one would be able to come over until Thursday, since the office had already closed on Tuesday and Wednesday was a national holiday in Brazil. Once Thursday rolls around though, he said, they’d be able to help get me back onto the road to the USA, assuming LAN hadn’t come around in that time yet.

LAN… looking back on it that name still gives me the chills. It had been six hours and I still hadn’t heard anything concrete from them, and still had no idea where my ID was, who had it, or what they were even doing with all this time. I decided that enough was enough, and went to the “Policia Federal” for some assistance. As much as people warn you against trusting local police, the Policia Federal turned out to my greatest allies outside of the US Consulate during this entire situation. They were able to put me in direct contact with LAN airlines main office in Sao Paulo, at which point I found out that they were holding onto my ID for “Security checks”, and that I wouldn’t be seeing it anytime soon. They did, however, tell me that there would be a LAN airlines rep coming to meet me shortly, who would give me a meal card and set me up with a hotel in the airport. I, of course, didn’t ask for a name or phone number to contact them again… a move I would regret.

*** NOTE if you are ever in a situation like this, in any country, including your own, make sure to keep a list of all the people you have worked with, and a way to contact them. I started doing this later on in this adventure, and it was quite possibly the move that helped me the most. ***

The LAN rep had told me that their person would meet me at gate 16 at 7:00, so I wandered around for a bit before sitting down at gate 16 at around 6:45. I kept a weather eye out, hoping to recognize someone in the crowd, hoping against hope that it would be the same man who had taken my ID. I kept perfect watch as long as I could, but around 7:45 I started to slack off on my watchman duties. By 8:00 I was reading my book, and thus when he finally showed up at 8:15 I was a bit startled when I heard a heavily-accented voice calling out for a “BeeenjimAN HAAAttt”.

I pack up my gear and follow along, while the LAN guy explains the whole situation to me. He tells me lots of awesome things about the meal ticket and where I’ll be housed. He tells me that the whole thing will be organized by a company called “Orbital”, who will make sure I’m set up and will keep me in contact with the folks at LAN. After he introduced me to the Orbital rep he said goodbye and ran off. Quite quickly, almost intentionally quickly, before I was able to actually look at the Lodging, or ask him about the meal card. Whoooo boy… I can’t blame him.

Turns out that the “Meal Card” was only for breakfast the next day, and this “Orbital lodging company” is actually just an auxilliary airport support company who maintains a small room in the airport for travelers staying more than 12 hours. The room itself was actually nothing more than a 15′ x 10′ room with two bathrooms and a light switch; no cots beds or blankets, not even any furnishings to speak of. And most importantly, a detail the LAN person had neglected to mention? The “representative” is actually a guard.

That’s right, a full guard. I was required to remain in the rest area, and wasn’t allowed to leave without being escorted by this guard, for the duration of my stay in Sao Paulo airport. All food had to be brought to me, and I had to sleep in the room provided; a room comprised of bare cement floors and bathroom lights that spilled into the sleeping area, keeping it dimly lit 24 hours a day. And, of course, I wasn’t the sole occupant of this room either, far from it in fact. I was bunking down with four other guys; two Indian dudes who didn’t speak English and spit on the floor every 10s (not exaggerating, between the two of them they actually kept a fairly calming rhythm of spit-patters) and two Bhutanese teenagers who were asleep by the time I was welcomed into the room.

I drifted off to a restless sleep around 3:00 after doing some reading in the hopes of calming my nerves. I knew that I was too wired to actually get any meaningful rest, but also knew in the pit of my stomach that I would need all the rest I could get.

Oct13

And it all comes tumbling down

Posted on by
Standard

I arrived in Argentina full of fire and passion; ready to take the country by storm. I had my immigration forms filled out and checked, and I had double-checked my CouchSurfing host while I was at the hostel that morning. With my notebook full of phone numbers and directions to her house I had boarded the plane with a feeling of invulnerability which lasted exactly up until I realized that I was fucked, completely and totally.

I walked into the immigration section of the airport, adjusted my bag, threw my jacked over my shoulder and walked into the line. Then, I reached for my passport and the immigration forms I had filled out earlier. Reached for, but didn’t grab. I had put them between my jacket and my bag, theoretically to keep them safe from being bent but in reality so that they could fall out without me noticing.

Yep, thats right. I was in a foreign country, not even past immigration, with no passport. Now, that doesn’t seem so bad on the onset, and I wasn’t too worried at first, assuming that it was on the bus or the pavement outside. I checked, not on the pavement. I checked the entryway, not in the entryway. I asked the guys nearby if they could call the bus back to check it, they checked and none of the buses had seen anything. Well… maybe its on the airplane? Nope, though the cleaning crews HAD gone through already, but they’d never throw out a passport. What they would throw out, however, was the folder that I had my immigration papers inside of. The folder that I also had my passport in. The folder that was now gone.

I knew that a passport was an important document, quite possibly my MOST important document, but what I didn’t know was that a passport is, in the eyes of officials, the only thing that can enter a country. The person is merely the vessel that carries the passport, and no other form of “identification” can substitute. After none of the folks who had helped me search for the missing document were able to help, I was assigned a rep from LAN airlines, the outfit that had flown me in. When I first met her I knew I was in trouble; she didn’t speak more than a few dozen words of English, and did not seem at all inclined to listen to me or try to help. Her only job, from the moment she met me, was to make me go away and leave them alone.

It turns out the solution to my stubborn existence was waiting on the tarmac, fueled and prepped to go and fly me away. My liason, excitement etched into her features, told me that she had finally contacted the main office, and they had set everything up for me; I was going to be flown back to Boston via Sao Paulo, the airport that I had just come from, and the airport that a plane was just not about to leave on. They handed me my checked luggage, put a tag on it, and the maintenance crews stowed it away while I got onto the flight. My liason even gave me a kiss on the cheek for good luck.

The flight back to Sao Paulo was actually the best flight I’ve had so far, thanks to one simple phone call I made while we were still on the tarmac. I had been keeping my mom up-to-date via text, so now that I was set I gave her a ring and told her the whole story, ending the call after a good 10min of talking and complaining about everything. I had been seated next to a fairly amazingly hot latina woman and the guy I thought to be her boyfriend, and he quickly asked me what had happened, apologizing for having overheard my rant. We then launched into a full-on chatting session, telling each other all about our trips so far.

  • They’re from Portugal, and speak extremely good English
  • They’re a newlywed couple on their honeymoon, taking two months off work to travel South America (a present from multiple family members)
  • Bolivia is awesome, and they had pictures to prove it
  • Europeans favor boring and simple wedding bands, unlike crazy-cool ones from the States
  • Buenos Aires can be more dangerous than I thought, but the key is to be smart; Camera’s are the primary thing stolen on the street, from what they said
  • Life without a passport sucks

After the first few hours of chatting we all sat back and chilled out; I spent some time reading and dozing off while they read some magazines and played what looked to be a rather epic game of sudoku. We finally landed in Sao Paulo and I was ready to face the world again; from what the LAN rep in Buenos Aires had told me there would be a person waiting for me as soon as I got out of the plane.

And, for once, everything went to plan. While there wasn’t anyone directly outside, I did find some people right outside the gate who were more than willing to help me out, though it did take a while since they were also boarding another plane at the time. After the boarding was done their supervisor came to talk to me, and we finally got down to the brass tacks of getting me back into the trip. He looked some stuff over, called Buenos Aires, and generally seemed to be laying it out and getting shit done. He asked if I had any ID on me, and if I had any information about my future flights, and I gave them to him on the assumption that he’d be looking them over and giving them back. And when I handed those over, I quite possibly made the worst mistake of the day, second only to not putting my passport back into my pocket. Welcome to my life in the airport.

Oct12

Notes on Venezuela

Posted on by
Standard

Notes from Venezuela:

 

  • Venezuelans are born lucky. They must be to survive driving the way they do.
  • Gol Varig is an awesome airline: they gave me a Sandwich! For free! Without me asking!
  • Not many people seem to actually like Chavez
  • The whole socialism thing is really strange when you think about it from a capitalist standpoint… just so many things are different. Upside? Free parties, sandwiches and beers. Downside? Enforced minimum lease terms of three years, and massive sanctions for “the rich”, as defined as… whatever they feel like?
  • Strange side of Socialism: since the government owns everything, they can do whatever they want with it. Example: Some of the hotels in La Guira were closed and turned into refugee apartments after a natural disaster in the interior. I honestly don’t know how I feel about that, since my capitalist side is saying that it cost them a ton in tourism (directly and indirectly), but my “help the world” side is saying that our country should be able to help our citizens that way.
  • Salsa dancing is FUN! Especially when you’re being taught by a Venezuelan girl 😀
  • People are nice: everyone I met was pretty friendly, from the taxi drivers to the random guy on the street who stopped me not to steal my stuff, but to ask for directions. One older couple even helped me and Ana write down some important Spanish phrases.
  • Hipsters have invaded every country. Heaven help us.
  • Fanny packs have invaded Venezuela, and have attached themselves to everyone. Seriously. Pretty much every random person I passed on the street had a fanny pack, worn in the front.
  • The beaches are totally rad, we need more of this.
  • Tts strange what super-cheap gas does. Seriously, Gas in Venezuela is ~$0.25 a gallon, and thus public transportation is just $0.125 per trip on the Metro, and $1 for a 1 hour bus ride outside of the city.