navigate:
Wednesday 2007-04-04 - Amsterdam, the Netherlands
No problem, just a light panic
I had been clever and ordered a taxi via an Internet taxi broker. The whole ordering process went smoothly, and I expected the taxi at 8:15 — ready with my luggage outside. Except the taxi doesn’t appear and I had forgotten to put the phone number of the taxi company in my phone. Maybe he’s going to Carla’s house first? I call Carla and get her son: Carla is — just like me — ready outside with her luggage. Helpfully, he looks up the number for me in Carla’s email. But just when I start entering the number, the taxi arrives. We’re just on our way when Carla’s son calls me: what’s happening? “We’re on our way”, I say. The driver had told me he’d just come from the airport, and it was exceptionally busy on the road. Great. And he wants to turn on the meter. No, no - we have a fixed price!
So, we pick up Carla, and (via a slight detour because the driver doesn’t seem to know the fastest route to get out of the city) we’re on our way to Schiphol, Amsterdam. That’s stretching it: we do a lot of waiting at first — it is indeed very busy. Carla has a bright idea: let’s call Sander (the director of the tour operator who’s awaiting us at the airport with our tickets) that we’re on our way. Except I had also forgotten to put Sanders phone number in my phone — and my papers with the number are in the trunk — brilliant. Using my phone, Carla calls home, and manages to call her daughter in law out of bed, who helpfully looks up the number. Then I call Sander, who tells me: “I see happy faces here that you two are coming, too!”.
We’re definitely late now, but the traffic has cleared up. Then when the driver wants to enter the area before the gates, he misses the beam coming down after the car before him, and steps on his brakes. I shoot forward, bump my hand into the driver’s seat (it seems lightly contused) and my hat jumps off my head and lands in the driver’s lap. He apologizes, but I’m irritated. We don’t give him a tip when he drops us off.
Sander is there to welcome us — this must be a great day for him, sending off the first group of his new company! We’re not even the latest. Then, when we start to check in, another panic: Maria suddenly misses her ticket… She’s positive she did get it from Sander, but it’s nowhere to be found. Did she drop it? I call Sander again, hoping he can assist — luckily he’s not far, just upstairs, lingering around for he didn’t know what — my call, obviously. He soon reassures Maria: she can come, all the tickets are in the computer. That helps: now she finds here ticket after all!
From then on everything goes smoothly, and we arrive in Istanbul on time.
Wednesday 2007-04-04 - Istanbul, Turkey
Plain sailing now
Not much to tell about the second lap of the trip: we have several hours to kill at the airport (but need to set our watches one hour forward), and spend the time shopping (a little), chatting to get to know each other (especially the “new” group members, and (some of us) having our “last” beer — no such thing in Yemen! No trouble checking in without a Yemeni visa in our passports (Sander had given us all a letter just in case they’d make trouble over that, which happens sometimes). Taking off from the airport we have a spectacular view over Istanbul by night. On the plane a nice dinner, with “really the last beer” - Efes, a very good Turkish pilsener.
We arrive in Sana’a on time. Then we just have to be a little patient, waiting in line for our visas, but people are friendly and there’s no trouble at all. Meanwhile Marie Josee is awaiting us, and already collecting our luggage. It’s great to see her again!
Outside we meet our team, three drivers, one each from a different tribe. They seem very nice. But, all in all, it’s 2:30 when we arrive in our hotel (in the old city, just west of the Zailer wadi which crosses it) where Mohamed is awaiting us with a cup of tea. It’s 3:00 when we finally tumble into bed: it’s been a long day, but we’re here!
