On a shuttle bus from Saint Petersburg to Veliky Novgorod, June 30, 2006

Unusual cars and signs all in Cyrillic thus far are the only superficial or significant differences between Russia and Alaska. The churches help paint the scene as well—more orthodox domed churches than not. It will be a long drive to Novgorod, but not as long as the back and forth I will do later this weekend.

It is a miracle that I am even here. Mostly a miracle of my own design, given the physical and mental fortitude required to run as fast as I could with my carryon luggage through the JFK Airport.

My flight from Dulles finally fell out of the sky around 5:20 p.m. (original arrival time was 1:47 p.m.). My flight to Helsinki on Finn Air departed at 5:55. I reflected on this with beads of sweat, while I sat in my seat aboard the United Airlines commuter jet, diagonal from the woman patiently waiting to get to Kenya, waiting for the plane currently parked in our gate at Terminal 7 to get the fuck out of there.

At 5:35 p.m., I managed to find myself on the Air Train to the various terminals at JFK after a fit of sprinting and asking directions to Terminal 8 with, I’m sure, a note of urgency detectable.

“Next Stop, Terminals 5 and 6.”

I have to go the entire loop around JFK to reach Terminal 8.

I rocket out of the Air Train and find the all but deserted international check-in space at Terminal 8. Two uniform-wearing women stand and talk at the Finn Air counter.

“My plane from Dulles just got in! I need to get on the 5:55 flight to Helsinki”

She checks me in and gives me directions to departure gate 23. I proceed to run right past the hard u-turn I needed to make. A security guard straightens me out and I take off the right way, stopping once more when a lady behind a corner counter corrects my path.

There is no one in the security check line. A slender black man in a TSA uniform points to the right. I sprint for the door in that direction, assuming he was briefed on my dire situation.

“Hey! Stop!”
“Oh.”

I go through security. They assure me my plane is still here and remind me that rushing could slow down the process if I make a mistake.

Shoes back on, I jog up to the gate.

“Erhardt! You made it!”

The story is told and retold as I board the plane with scant minutes to spare.

I am safe. I made the flight—I was convinced, though, that my checked luggage had not. Which brings me to now, after JFK adventures, red wine and Finnish beers, a surrealistic romance comedy titled The Other Side and a close call connection in Helsinki to my flight to Saint Petersburg, there is the confirmation that my luggage did not in fact make it with me.

It will, or it may, arrive tomorrow, or the next day, from JFK to Helsinki to Saint Petersburg. And then, I will have to pick it up… at the airport… 6 hours there and back from my soon to be seen home in Novgorod.

In flight from Washington, DC to New York City, June 29, 2006

I am sitting on UA7310 service to New York—JFK. It is nearly four hours passed the time that this plane should have departed from the Washington—Dulles tarmac.

I am reflecting on my plight. First, it was commiserating with a thin man with hints of silver in his hair from Senegal. We both want to catch our ~6 p.m. flights out of the country. However, our problems are easily dwarfed—compared to the woman from South Carolina sitting diagonal in front of me. She has an absolute right to reflect, commiserate, and complain.

I am awed by the patient woman’s three DAY layover in Dulles Airport. One of a group of 18 headed to Kenya for a mission trip—18 out of 5200 stranded by weather-related delays and cancellations on Tuesday, June 27th. Yet, as sad as her story of sitting at the bottom of the standby list and calling 800 numbers until someone on the not quite toll-free line would help her…

I am worried about my own situation. I have never flown internationally before. I have never been to the JFK Airport. I have never been to Russia. And I fear that I will still not be there come the predetermined arrival time printed on my itinerary.

I am convinced now, to boot, that the only thing worse than getting in a terminal with a connecting flight to catch and watching the estimated departure time of your flight vary on some sort of sinister sine curve is enduring all of those maladies minus your cell phone. I couldn’t just call home and hear a reassuring voice or call my program coordinator (Liza) and explain my situation. I just sat there… stewing in a community vat of frustration and pessimism.