so, I’m nearing the end of my second tour (well part 1 of it) and almost 5 weeks on the road, I haven’t sent out a single postcard BUT this next story gives you a little insight as to why.
So, I leave Jerusalem last Friday (May 30) on Nesher ( a share taxi) to get to the Tel Aviv airport. I leave around 8 pm with a flight at 11:30 thinking it’s more than enough time. Of course I forget that we have to pick up 6 other people from all over Jerusalem and wouldn’t you know I get the crazy driver on the sabbath. Jeru is a ghost town and this doesn’t help as streets are closed off. So I’m sitting in the backseat, rocking out, hoping and praying we get to the airport before 10 so I can get through security in time. No big deal, everywhere else it has taken me 35 minutes total. Someone may have mentioned that they recommend 3 hours before in Israel but come on, that’s silly, right?
Wrong. We roll in at 9:45. Sweet. I pay the man, toss my bags on a cart and steer it in. First, I sit in a line to check my luggage thru security before I can even check in for my flight. I get questioned by 3 different people and asked the same 10 questions over and over. Though it makes sense, I don’t have an Israeli stamp in my passport and I’m going to Syria in a few weeks so I’m suspect already. I get a 5 put on my bag and pass thru the first checkpoint.
Then I go to check my luggage checked out before getting my ticket. Apparently 5 isn’t a good thing and my checked bag needs to be completely unpacked (which I spent 20 minutes doing so it would all fit perfectly) and all my inner bags need to be unpacked. She swabs my luggage with some thing, gets checked by another lady then I can pack everything back up, while being watched and sent to check in. I was also questioned several times as to why I don’t have a paper ticket. It’s an e-ticket peple and I’m traveling.
I check in for my flight but since I have a backpack it needs to go in oversized luggage. I go to drop this off but need to pass by someone checking tickets and passports. Something is amiss and I have to follow her back to where my luggage was searched. Apparently a number wasn’t checked off and it looked like I hadn’t had my baggae checked. We get that settled and I drop off my bag.
I grab some water and a coke, trying to spend the last of my shekels, and head to another security checkpoint. Ticket and passport checked again and I walk to be screened. I get motioned over to a less frequented security checkpoint and I take off all my metal and anything else. I hand them my passport, get a look from them and head through. I’m sitting there, waiting for my bags, smirking at all the ites people are trying to carry through, like a 16 piece knife set. Come on people. Knives, on a plane?! That wouldn’t fly even before tighter regulations.
So, I’m waiting and getting slightly impatient but try to appear compliant. I get asked the usual questions of who packed this, was it out of your sight. The security girl starts to unpack things from my bag to run it through security again and asks me the following question: So, did you just graduate high school, are you doing a gap year? Di
d I just graduate high school?! The last time I mistaken as 6 years younger was when I showed Kevin a picture of me from freshman year track and he said I looked nine years old. Hence why I almost always wear makeup now.
No, I respond, I graduated from ollege two years ago and I’m just traveling for a few months. She says, oh, you look young. (Well yes, if you’re going off my passport picture (I was 16) and my slightly disheveled state then yes, I look younger but not 18!) She then goes on to say how she’d like to travel but she’s in school and has too much responsibility. I’m once again reminded (and humbled) about how lucky I am to live in the States, have money to travel and the desire to do so.
The head of security comes over and starts asking me questions saying you’re the one who is traveling for a while and going through Syria. Yep, they know me now. I tell her there aren’t any sharp objects and yes I did pack it. She looks at the screen asking if I have anything metal, a bullet perhaps? I’m slightly taken aback until I realize there’s a 90 year old bullet in my bag from a battlefield at Gallipoli.
You read that right, a ninety year old bullet.
I made it through all of Turkey’s checkpoints, getting into Israel, and through most of the beginning checkpoints to forget about the bullet that’s so rusted and crusted over it wouldn’t work anyway. I start to profusely apologize and explain but she just gives me a look that says Dumb American, finds the bullet and tosses it into the confiscated bin. I’m left to pack my bag and get through passport control in 15 minutes before my flight begins to board.
Brilliant, now I just need to jump the hurdle of explaining why here is no stamp in my passport and not get one in there so I can enter Syria. I hop into a line that looks like it feeds into two booths. But then somehow people split the line and I get stuck behind 5 rows of couples who decide to go through singly. I’m pacing, cursing silently and wanting to hit something as I have 3 minutes to get there. FInally, I get up there, quickly start to explain myself but the woman says, oh ok no stamp. She stamps my boarding ticket and I sail through.
This is just 3 hours friends.
I settle into my half hour flight, get through oOrdan and buy a visa so I don’t have to do it later, worrying that maybe they said I came from Tel Aviv and possibly ruining my entrance into Syria but I forget it. I find some chairs to lay on, roll out the sleeping bag Matt P. gave me and settle in to read and try to sleep away the next 8 hours. (By the way, Amman has a terrible airport, at least my terminal. Smelling of smoke, dirty bathrooms, and just generally gross. I’d rather be in Detroit).
I attempt to board my flight when they call me but the security tell me to wait 10 minutes. Another woman tries but gets told the same thing. We sit and a line of men form. 2 minutes later they pull back the rope and let the men through. The woman and I roll our eyes, join the line and get motioned to a security point with a woman where we go behind a curtain and are patted down. The men get to walk right through. Love this country. As I wait I realize that there are 5 women on the flight, 3 with kids and a lot of men. That is til we’re settled in and an Indian tour group comes on with mostly women.
The flight to Cairo is uneventful. I purchase my visa, get hassled about a cab and have to go to 2 different terminals to find an ATM. I hop into an old black cab, fear the driving and end up paying more than I should. They always try to squeeze you. I settle into my hotel, sorta. I have to wait for my room, telling me 5 minutes but it’s more like 20. Eventually I hop on the overpriced internet, just barely finshing before our meeting. I meet a bunch of aussies and we set off on a tour of Cairo. To a mosque and a couple of street markets we go. And the staring is back in full force. As is the shouting of Shakira, Shakira. It’s good to be back.
We’re kicking it outside a bazaar, smiling at the locals and I play with a baby. Then I notice all these kids running around playing soccer in front of a mosque. I ditch the sandals, bag and sunnies and join them, entrtaining the entire crowd and surprising many people by being a white westerner playing soccer and not totally sucking. I’m dripping sweat, my feet are nasty and I must rest as some of the kids start fighting and I don’t want to be the cause. Some kids ask me to keep playing but we have to go to a Sufi dancing show. We head back across the street and sit in a hot open air room. We’re an hour early so I ask Adam, a canadian who just met up with our tour group, if he wants to go for a walk.
Thus begins a 1.5 hour adventure involving: getting lost on the backstreets of Cairo, me wearing a tank top and jeans (totally flashy there) which elicits shouts, disgusted stares and a kid sticking his tongue out at me, a furniture market, a picture with a goat, getting several wrong directions, many more leers, a few marriage proposals, one time of actually being scared and finally finding a soldier who stops a passing man who speaks english. He gives us the right directions. We make our way back, catch 15 minutes of the dancing and questions about where we were. We answer while following our guide so we can get 75 cent falafel. It is delicious. We head back in a cab, grab some water and fanta from the corner kiosk and I fall into bed.
And that’s just my first day.
