Martes, 17 Julio 2012. Taxi
over to the departure terminal at 3:30am cost P$100, as we weren't up
to walking even three blocks at that hour of the night. As it is it
was at least a ten minute ride as one-way limited access streets
makes it hard to get back to the terminal conveniently. Waited 15
min for check-in at 4am when gate clerks started, hundreds of people
waiting. While waiting for the first
flight, a Chinese fellow sat down beside us and talked our ears off.
He was most interesting though. He is teaching Chinese at a
university in Puebla. One thing we learned, is that in China
children are obligated by the state to take care of their parents.
If they do not, and the parents do not have savings to support
themselves, the government takes money from their wages to pay for
the parents' care.
Most pleased with ourselves,
being early and all checked. The lady that checked us in upgraded
our seats so that we could sit together on the second flight, without
us even asking. She told us to just show our FMM form she told us to
fill out, to the person checking us onto the plane. We did not have
our original FMM this time, since we gave it up to obtain the five
year resident's visa. We walked up and got in the line to get on the
plane and lo and behold, the attendant got very upset with us for not
having our form stamped. Next time we will know. We were kicked
out of line, and had to go to an immigration office to get our papers
stamped before we could board the plane. The plane was due to leave
in 25 minutes. Boy did we walk fast! Asking here and there where
this office was, an attendant told us which was the closest. Made
it with ten minutes to spare, a huffin and puffin.
Since we had but the one small bag we were
carrying, and we had a five hour layover, we got off the plane last.
Mistake. Houston's custom line was a total boondoggle. Many
hundreds of people waiting in a long snaking folded line that moved
ever so slowly. The line that was for customers with no checked bags
was closed. The other area for those with checked bags had 40
stations and ONLY three were open. While in line we kept hearing
people say that they missed their connecting flight. One lady came
up to an attendant near us and said she had lost her mother-in-law
who was in a wheel chair. The attendant started laughing and asked
how that was possible. The next thing that happened was an attendant
came through the front area holding the hand of a little girl,
yelling at the top of her voice a good five minutes saying that this
girl could not find her mother. Finally someone in the middle of the
hundreds raised her hand. The immigration clerks were taking forever
with each party, seemed like everyone had to press fingers down on a
scanner to get fingerprints checked. Amazingly, for unknown reasons
we were just asked a few brief questions and were waved right
through.
Now why did we have to go
thru security again? Same hundreds of people. Far more efficient
here. However, besides taking off shoes, belts, everything out of
pockets, including kleenex packets, the attendants tried to tear out
our sewn in extra pockets, not believing they weren't holding
anything. Two hours to get thru immigration, customs and another
security. Long walk to our next gate. Found a Subway for lunch.
There were no empty tables. One table did have some food containers
on it, perhaps discards, and we assumed wrongly that the person had
left. The gentleman, an airport employee, returned with more food
and was not angry with us as he wandered off and found a single seat
elsewhere.
The second flight, flying above the cumulus – we had
a young fellow from Puebla, Mexico sit next to us. He was most
fascinated by the mountains and snow. His English was good. Our
flight got into Seattle 20 minutes early. With very fast walking we
just made the 5pm Airporter bus. The lady behind us had a terrible
cold. Sure hope we do not get it. The second part of our bus ride
into Anacortes, the driver let us out at Commercial and 34th,
so we had a shortish walk home. Arrived to find that Sally, the
neighbor with our house keys, not home. Thankfully our stashed
outside keys were in the right place. We did remember how to unalarm
our new house alarm system. Seems that our cats set it off about six
times while we were gone. It is very loud and one of the neighbors
at least got really angry at being woken up at 5am. We are trying to
find out how to undo the outside portion of the alarm. Shower, soup
and bed for us. The total trip house to house takes, at best, a bit
longer than 24 hours. Today we were up at 1am (Seattle time) in
Mexico City, and got home before 8pm, for a long 19 hour day.
Our moving company has been
notified, and someone will be here the next few days to see exactly
how the movers will handle our goods. Since much is already packed, they might get it all done in one, instead of two days. We're still planning for the
first week of September. Sure is cold up here, summer definitely did not arrive here in our three week absence. Found that the new
sidewalk at the front of our house will make the driveway too steep.
We told the city and construction company our concerns and they
assure us that it will be corrected. Next week will tell. Bye for
now--posts will be infrequent until end of September or so.
Oh my, but we do have lots
of excitement in store for us! Down our way visiting beautiful Veracruz? Please do visit us.
Will be a year before we will actually feel ready to house you in
perfect comfort, but so what – feel free to come earlier if you
wish, if you don't mind a little indoor camping as we renovate and
add on to our new home.
Carmen and Dan
