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Sunday 2006-09-03 - Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Packing and off!
To my relief, I manage to pack all my equipment, cables and films into my small carry-on suitcase, with room to spare for my shoulder bag. That’s a good start.
Next on the list is finishing my documentation for the new version of my travel blog software (so I’ll actually know how to use it when traveling). In the middle of these preparations I get an email from my host explaining about the database problems I’d been having (actually crashing the site); unfortunately, the instructions I’m given don’t work and I have no time left for debugging the problem before I leave; all I can do is print out some emergency documentation so I can “break in” to restart the database if necessary … but I definitely won’t be able to do that while in the DPRK. All I can do then is keeping my fingers crossed the site will keep running.
At exactly 17:00 the taxi is there; the driver calls my phone instead of ringing the doorbell to announce his arrival.
I’m off!
Sunday 2006-09-03 - Amsterdam to Beijing, the Netherlands
Flying over Groningen
At the airport in Amsterdam I meet Frits again, the only fellow traveler I’d met before, and Thekla who will probably be my room mate. The others have gone through check-in already. Since we’re not checking in as a group, we’re also not sitting together on the plane.
On the plane, a China Southern Boeing 777, they tell us we’re going to fly 10,200km, a 9-hours flight. Take off at 20:20. At first, the in-flight information, shown on individual displays mounted in the backs of the chairs, is … well, hardly there: they seem to be setting up or debugging the system, and we see only screenful after screenful of unintelligible numbers. But when they finally get it going, it’s actually nice with a feature I have not seen before: the “satellite view” (showing the plane’s position and route as if from space) is alternated with a kind of “bird’s eye view”, looking forward from above in the direction of the flight.
At 20:30 I note we’re actually flying over Groningen, where my parents live. Mentally, I wave goodbye to them.
After a nice dinner I wait for the worst turbulence to pass before a visit to the bathroom and I go off to “bed”.
