Since they're asking, I'll write. About the USA. I'm warning all interested, uninterested, and other parties. I'm a provincial guy, haven't been many places, haven't seen much, and on top of that, I'm nervous.
People have written about the USA a thousand times before me, but the masses crave personal impressions. I'll give it a try.
First off - about the flight.
I flew to Brussels with Air Baltic, bought the ticket on www.letasaviobiletes.lv, while my boss, who was also flying out to the US a week later, got his on www.lidot.lv. Actually, there are a ton of these sites, but it seems most of them use the exact same reservation system, and even look identical, except for the color scheme. They say it's best to check ticket availability for a route on a site like this, but buy the ticket directly from the airline, though for my first time I decided not to overthink it. A round-trip ticket from June 2nd to 17th cost me 405 Ls ($900). Judging by the ticket, the site only took a 5 lats cut – the rest went to the airline.
I hadn't flown anywhere on a plane before that, so the experience was educational. I spent the night at a friend's place in Riga, woke up at 5 AM, and arrived at the airport at 5:40 by taxi, which cost 7 Ls ($15). Buses don't run at night, plus my friend lives quite far out – in Valdlauči, past the Riga city limit sign. The flight was departing at 7. By the way, Riga airport is the largest in the Baltics and is actively expanding. I don't even know if that's reasonable, considering the creepy horror stories about the imminent end of oil-based civilization. Like, last night I spent 3 hours reading a series of articles on LiveJournal. Sounds terrifying, but I've long since lost faith in my ability to analyze complex information – maybe the author is paranoid and doesn't see the whole picture, or maybe he's right and we're all completely fucked.
During the trip, I experienced some minor issues, and they started right at the airport. First, the question arose: which line to stand in? Turned out there was one single line for the entire economy class, and it slithered like a snake along all the registration counters, which the bourgeoisie call "check-in." After standing in line, I walked up to the wrong counter - it turned out to be for business class. Then I quickly returned to the peasant line, and, after stressing out a bit about the time, soon successfully registered, got my ticket stub, return ticket, and permission to board (boarding pass). True, they told me my luggage was checked through to Orlando, even though I was flying to Chicago. But flying high on my successful check-in, I didn't pay attention to that - and good thing I didn't. The flight was boring, but on the bright side, I literally had three seats all to myself, and watched all the beautiful sights out the window, since the weather was excellent. The funniest sensation is when the plane accelerates to several hundred km/h in a matter of seconds right at the very beginning. The engine makes fierce noises and everything inside the plane vibrates and shakes. I'm generally a nervous guy, but only when interacting with people - apparently, I trust machines more. So the flight itself gave me nothing but positive emotions. But things were worse in the airports.
I was flying through Brussels, which, as we know, is the capital of Europe, because it hosts part of the European Parliament, the European Commission, and NATO. From above, Brussels looks like endless garden beds (of Brussels sprouts, obviously) and a few smoking chimneys closer to the center. Something like this.
Hercules Seghers. View of Brussels, 1625
Brussels, it seems, is a boring bureaucratic city with a population of around a million, including the suburbs. In Brussels, we arrived at the very last gate, aka the passage to the plane for boarding and disembarking. What to do next wasn't entirely clear, but sound reasoning and recommendations from experienced dog breeders suggested the answer – I had to first exit the gate area, check in for the flight to the US, and go back in through security. Finding the check-in caused issues again - first, it took me forever and a day to walk out of the gate area, despite the moving walkways, then I tried to find the check-in for American Airlines, which was operating my flight on behalf of Brussels Airlines. I asked at the latter's ticket counter where I should go, thank god I somewhat know English. I don't get much speaking practice, so I spent a long and stubborn time explaining that I was flying to Chicago. Ultimately they told me to go to a certain aisle, but it turned out to be the wrong one again. But at least I asked again there. Those comrades deliberated for a long time, but in the end could only offer a recommendation to look at the departures board. My flight was naturally nowhere to be found there – I suppose it was still too early, because I had a 2.5-hour layover. I eventually found a booth with a blue letter I on its side, and there I finally figured out where American Airlines was. I should note that there are monitors hanging over the check-ins with the company names, but since the flight was booked through Brussels Airlines and operated by American Airlines, one of them was written in tiny letters, which didn't make the search any easier.
A couple of American bureaucrats were standing in front of the check-in, one of whom unhurriedly asked if I had my baggage tag. Out of nervousness, I said I didn't think so, even though they had given me the tag in Riga along with my own flight ticket stub. The official told me not to be nervous, and started asking all sorts of questions like whether I was carrying a ton of explosives, and whether anyone had slipped a kilogram of uranium into my suitcase. What you're supposed to answer if you want to fly should be obvious, unless you're a complete retard.
At check-in, I handed over my tag and received another boarding pass, that is, permission to board the plane, as well as directions on which gate to go to. Then I stomped along for a long and stubborn time (logical, right?), the only nice thing being that the entrances to the gate area are split up for EU citizens and non-citizens, although that didn't help me. But it immediately makes you feel like a white man (That's a joke, in case anyone has trouble grasping irony).
In the end, I nervously awaited boarding by the gate counter, because it wasn't very clear - what flight is even boarding, what the boarding order is, and the time on their screen showed something weird too. Or maybe it just all seemed that way to me from anxiety, and in reality everything there was perfectly clear. I don't know.
In any case – it's good to know bourgeois languages, especially English, though in Brussels everyone clearly would have understood French too.
The boarding went slowly, but without incident; I was sitting right by the window next to some Indian guy, who later pulled out a laptop with a half-eaten apple in the center, but for some reason booted up Linux.
I'm generally a mega-cosmopolitan, but I just don't like Indians purely on looks. Plus, back when I lived in the dorms, they used to shower in their underwear. Infidels, in a word. In the airport, by the way, there were two of every kind of creature – Africans in colorful national clothes with ships on their heads, Muslim women in hijabs, and Americans in shorts and with backpacks.
In any case, it wasn't bad on the plane – by plugging in your headphones, you could watch TV or listen to special airplane radio stations with some selection of muzak, totaling 12 in all. They say that on some airlines' flights even in economy class there are TVs with on-demand movies on every seat, but we were fine with what we had. On TV, they talked about how cleverly Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum used oil reserves to transform the city of Dubai from a desert into a metropolis, packed with skyscrapers and shopping malls, in twenty years.
Dubai at night
If you, unlike me, have never heard of Dubai, read up on it, it's worth it. Or here, from www.membrana.ru :
Also read about other wonders of Dubai: Jurassic Park, the skyscrapers Pentominium, Lighthouse and Burj Dubai, the most luxurious underwater hotel Hydropolis and the Palm Islands.
For food, we were offered a choice of barbeque beef? or lasagna, and since I didn't quite catch the first option, I went with the second. Even here, the Americans' favorite trait of making food flavors overwhelmingly intense showed itself - salty, sweet, and seasoned with MSG on top. I'd known about this before, but this was my first time encountering it in reality. Overall - the food on planes is so-so, and on the way back I didn't eat as an experiment, details later. When we were already approaching, they also gave us pizza, which also tasted so-so. But it sure gave off a less than pleasant smell across the whole cabin.
The flight went off without a hitch, but when I disembarked at the airport, I needed to fill out a customs form. I've never in my life owned such an atavism as a ballpoint pen, nor do I know how to use one. I had to ask a female security guard. She, however, didn't give me her pen, reasoning that she needed it herself. But a baggage boy gave me one. I filled out the form a bit crookedly, but the customs official didn't really look at it - asked why I was traveling to the US and let me through. Funny enough, the official had a huge gold badge pinned to her uniform that said "US Customs Service". That was my first introduction to the Americans' love for slogans, mottos, and all sorts of signs written in huge letters, usually in bold font.
Officer means official, not military officer, just in case anyone wasn't aware
This part was the easiest - no lines or people, no one really looked at me, and they didn't check my luggage, although the guy right behind me got stopped for a random check. By the way, I forgot to mention - there was an art exhibition taking place in the corridors of the Chicago airport (O'Hare Intl, ORD). If I had known I wouldn't be picked up from the airport right away (see below) - I would have walked leisurely, checking out the mosaics and paintings.
When I walked out into the airport, my sister Alina was supposed to be waiting for me, since I was flying out to visit her, but for some reason she was nowhere to be seen. I had to pace back and forth, dragging my suitcase behind me, but strangely enough that didn't help. A middle-aged black brother offered me a taxi, but I explained to him that I didn't need a taxi. We chatted for a bit, if you can call a conversation where one side understands the other only 20 percent of the time a dialogue, and I went off to continue looking for a solution to my problem. The obvious thought - make a phone call. First I found a payphone, but for some reason it had signs saying $5, $10, $25. I now think that out of anxiety I hallucinated the $ sign instead of C. To make a call, I went to get some bills changed into coins. The currency exchange place didn't give me any change, and neither did the bar. So then I bought a glass of orange juice at McDonald's. The glass was huge, and the juice was super thick, which seemed unusual. Back home our juice is more watered down, I guess. The McDonald's worker gave me change, but since there was an acute shortage of it, I only got dimes. That's when it dawned on me that a colleague had gifted me two quarters before my flight. I dropped them into the machine, successfully got through, and found out that my sister had mixed up the time and would be there in 15 minutes.
And with that, the flight concluded.