Six Minutes…

From 25 July 2010

Six Minutes….That is the difference between catching a train and missing it. When traveling internationally by train, do not (I repeat) do NOT wait in the main station until the track number is announced. At this point you are too LATE and will most likely miss your train!! Good news for those traveling in London, you are not condemned to catch a different train. If you are in London you become a priority passenger.

The story behind this is as follows…we got to the train station an hour and a half early, but did not know what track to go to, so we assumed that we were to wait to find out. This was not true, as we discovered upon turning the corner towards the track. This turn revealed to us a long (and I mean l-o-n-g) line through immigration. Lucky for us, the ticket agent noticed our departure time, sent us to the front of the line, rushed us through security, and sent us to business class customs. We then booked it to the platform to find that we were on the furthest train car from the station. Again rushing down the platform we made it to our train car in time to wait for some other late-comers to put luggage on the car, then we boarded the train as it was pulling away from the station.

Lessons learned: (1) the British are wonderfully forgiving people and are very helpful to clueless travelers in high-stress situations; (2) never wait for a track number to be announced to begin the custom’s process.

I can also honestly say that I have never gotten through customs so quickly and efficiently, though I NEVER want to try that one again!

Technical Difficulties

Just a quick note to let you all know that I am currently experiencing technical difficulties with getting online. I will be continuing to write but will have to wait to post until I get a more solid internet connection. I apologize for the inconvenience, please continue to check back for more on AIDS2010!

Hofburg in Vienna

Spent the morning viewing the Sliver Collection, the Sisi Museum, and the Imperial Apartments at The Hofburg palace area. This area is a city within a city with several buildings, gardens, and squares. The Silver Collection is, in part, still used today for state dinners and is simply a massive collection of sliver, gold, and porcelain goods. The Sisi Museum tells about the tragic life and death of Empress Elizabeth. The Imperial Apartments are set up as they were used by Emperor Franz Joseph and Empress Elizabeth.
I have included pictures of some of the silver collection and the exterior of the buildings as well as some other facades from the area.

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People Watching

So we spent the evening people watching on the streets of Vienna. There were obvious Germans, and other Western-Europeans, there were British and American tourists, there were Arabs, Jews, Muslims, Russians, the list goes on. This made me think about the diversity of people in different countries. In the United States, we take pride in our “Melting Pot” status, but truly, walking down the streets of Vienna, or even Berlin, or Copenhagen, or Prague (all places I have been in the past) the diversity is so much more prevalent than it is in the US. In these European countries, people of all races, creeds, religions, and ethnicities seem to coexist on a different level than occurs in the US. Brawls and Gang fights and Terf-wars may exist in these European countries, but they seem much less of an issue than racial, ethnic, creedal, and religious “street” warfare in the US.
All of this is not to mention the visible cohabitation of generations in cities like Vienna. Tonight, there was not just a crowd of young singles, or older couples, or families, or middle aged couples. Instead there was a menagerie of generational representation present.
Just something I was thinking about as We watched the co-mingling of individuals on the streets of Venice.
Also, I have attached some pictures I took of Stephansplatz in the inner area of Vienna.

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Departures and Arrivals…Terminal What? 15-16 July 2010

We have finally made it to our hotel lobby in Vienna it is 7:49am on 16 July for all of you stateside. We have been travelling since 12:30pm 15 July (including drive time to the airport). There have been a few bumps in the road, but no major issues—the flights were great, planes were clean, everything landed early—all good things. However, I would highly suggest avoiding Boston in your international flight patterns, and here’s why. In order to board an international flight from Boston, you must leave the airport and your checked baggage behind, in order to board a bus to get to an entirely different terminal. Not a huge problem if you do not mind going through the ordeal of getting a boarding pass, going through security, and booking it to your next gate. Also, do not rely on the people who work at said airport to give comprehensive directions on how to get from Terminal B to Terminal E. We asked several people where we would catch our transfer flight and how to get there with a response of “oh just go to Terminal E.” There are no SIGNS for Terminal E, there are no random individuals working for the airport to simply guide you in the right direction, and it took us to the information desk to get an answer of where EXACTLY to go to get the bus to Terminal E and which bus—out of the dozens stopping for passengers “right outside the exit door”—we were supposed to take! We did of course make it to the plane in time, with enough to spare to grab a latté, but I believe some signs and directions next time would be much more greatly appreciated. This was not our only interesting connection, however, as we spent about an hour running a maze of London Heathrow International Airport in our travels today—er yesterday—who knows?!? Apparently LHR is quite the complex airport, as we had to walk through a maze of escalators, take a tram, take a bus, run through security, more escalators, an elevator, and then another bus to get from one plane to the next. Whoever thought airports would need tour guides to help people figure out how to get from one terminal to the next? Yes, I do realize that I’m used to Buffalo-Niagara International Airport, with a whopping ONE terminal, but seriously?!? This airport ground transport is crazy! Speaking of Buffalo, we did get to see a really cool training right before we boarded our first flight of the day. Today was training day for some young drug/bomb-sniffing dogs. I can’t say that I had ever really seen this practice take place. The human aspect of the K-9 unit set up some dummy suitcases that the dogs were to find then the handlers brought one dog at a time around to sniff. The dogs seemed to want to sniff more than what the handlers wanted them to, but it was awesome to see how responsive they were to their handlers’ commands. The first, dog was a German Shepherd, but the second two were black Labrador Retrievers (made me miss my girls!!). All three sniffed at the dummy bags, and quietly sat next to the bag to indicate something was fishy. No barking, no scratching at the bag, no nothing, just sitting next to a bag with who knows what in it, and being pet incessantly by their handlers. You could see it in the one lab’s face how much she adored her handler, and simply wanted to make him happy. Well, unless you all want to hear about the fact that we are sticking to everything here in Vienna on account of the heat, I’ll post this now and wait for more interesting and relevant things to discuss soon!

Under Construction

Greetings, and thanks for stopping by! I apologize for the old material on my blog. I am still getting used to the idea of writing out things on a regular basis. Please bear with me and check back soon for my first posts on the AIDS 2010 conference in Vienna, Austria.