Detective

Okay, I am going to be really honest, I am not perfect but I follow instructions (when heard and understood) and directions (when remembered). This is the second time that I have gotten off of a flight and needed to catch a connecting flight and I wound up outside of the airport! No idea what the heck is going on. Anyway, I got off of my flight in Vienna, which is already upsetting. This is the second time that I have been in Austria (train first time) and I have yet to be able to see Austria. One day I will return, hopefully with my mother, but still ARR!

Okay, so I get off of my flight, go through passport control and then I am at baggage claim. I ask the first person I can find where to go for a connecting flight and she said “oh it is too late, you have to leave and reenter, go left, left, left.” It is too late? I swear there was nowhere to go other than the path that I took! Whatever. I turned left, left, left and wound up where I saw signs for Terminal 1a, 1b, and 2. That is great but my plane is leaving from terminal 3. I ask the kind polizie with his giant gun (I am getting ready for Israel) where Terminal 3 is. He said there was no terminal 3 with a smile. I thought he was joking, but oh no, he was serious. He pointed me in a direction and I went.

I wound up at a new passport control and went through, worried that now I would have to go through security again, and get rid of the bottle of water that I just bought and possibly be late. I ask the lady at passport control as the monitor screen did not even have my flight listed on the departres. She said that I could enter here and stamped my passport. Okay, no stamps in France, Monaco, Italy, Germany, but two stamps in Austria…and I cannot even say that I have been here! I get inside and ask another person, they also looked at my boarding pass like it had three heads and then circled my gate number and said D28, it is straight ahead.

I walk and I arrive. Did I have to go through security? Where was the check point? Did I leave the airport or not? Am I even at the right place? All of these questions are going through my head as I am sitting here, waiting for someone to be at a counter so that I can ask them. Please let me catch my flight….

No worries the check in was where I was and it was super small check point but I am at the gate waiting with a new friend. He spent about two months in China and loved it. He told me I should have taken the train to the main train stop and then gotten a taxi, like I was looking to do, but honestly I am just happy I had some way to get to the hotel and check in and get in.

The plane ride was good, I got to watch Sex in the City 2, something I would never have seen otherwise. Then I got off the plane, went through passport checkpoint; no stamp in my book (not good as I need proof for London that I was out of the country!) then I headed to get my luggage which looks like someone took out a lot of frustration on, and then I found my taxi. Made it to the hotel and I am ready for bed with an almost dead computer and a electric converter that does not work in Israel. My new friend gave me places to go and see and emergency contact information in case the kibbutz does not work out for me. Let the adventure begin!