Posts tagged with "travel"
Thursday, 13. September 2007, 09:30:12
odd, travel, life, work
...
"Gipsy, give me your tears!"
On my way back to the pharmacy just now, a gipsy talked to me. Dude, that was so weird!
I *must* blag about it ;)
She said I would travel abroad, but not just now. Well, I didn't say, but the taxi picks me up in 10 minutes to go to the airport; I'm going to Boston for a few days, for work.
She told me to remember the number "19" because it is going to be important in the upcoming months.
She asked me if the initials M J F meant anything to me and I said no. But she said I should keep them in mind because they will matter soon.
Then she gave me a white plastic "stone" from the Saintes-Marie de la Mer, where she comes from). It's ugly. She said people must treat gipsies right (and she meant "generously"), so I gave her 5 euros. She must have thought she was in potentially good compagny, so she went on and read my palm.
She said I was lucky and other stuff and that I had an excellent memory (wrong!)
She asked me if I had undergone surgery in my life and I said no, and she said I never would. Amen.
That's when she said it usually costs EUR 20 to 30 for palm reading. She was _that_ close to add "otherwise the predictions don't work", I'm sure.
I didn't give her any more money but I'll slip the plastic thingie in my bag, just in case ;)
Update: I just thought I'd mention that the flight attendant, seeing I was pregnent, moved me from a seat at row 11 (exit) to row... 19!
No update on MJF.
Tuesday, 20. February 2007, 05:02:33
musings, introvert, travel
My parents sent me to the UK for 3 weeks, one summer, when I was 10. I stayed at the Carvers', in Frome, not far from Bristol and Bath.
I don't know why, but today I was reminded of watching TV during a weekend afternoon with their daughter, who was 13 years old. A soap opera was on and I was struggling (and quite failing) to understand what was going on.
I thought I had figured out the main female character was in early pregnancy. At this point I was barely paying attention to the show. I was looking for ways to speak to my companion. So I was rehearsing my side of the conversation, over and over.
Is she waiting for a baby?
That was the translation of "elle attend un bébé?", which is the French for "is she pregnant?", which I had never learnt to say.
And I rehearsed it (and other variations) for so long that eventually, it wasn't worth saying anymore.
I had been concerned not only with the language barrier --I suspected my words weren't right--, but also it was difficult for me to initiate the conversation. Yet, I wanted to. I didn't.
I am not sure whether I wanted to find out if the woman was actually expecting, or if I simply wanted to talk.
Saturday, 17. February 2007, 15:36:03
Las Vegas NV, Boston MA, work, San Jose CA
...
I was in London, headed to Los Angeles to hop on a flight to San Jose, California. It was a 19 hour trip, with 15 more to go. I stayed in California less than two days. I walked a bit (as a rule, I walk to the meeting venue), I scribed 1.5 day of meeting (a little less than 1200 lines in the IRC logs, a little more than 13000 words), I happily met with a friend and his wife that I hadn't seen in a while.
The next batch of flights didn't go so uneventfully. The flight from San Jose to Las Vegas was delayed by almost an hour. A shame since I had a shortish connection to make it to the Boston flight. So we landed mere minutes after the Las Vegas - Boston flight had left. The good thing was that I was were my suitcase was. I spent an hour in the America West customer assistance line, wondering where my legendary luck was and reflecting on how worse it could have been without the said luck. A very helpful lady booked me on a Delta flight to Boston. I had 5 hours to wait.
I walked from the airport to Las Vegas, at dusk, camera in hand. It was interesting. There aren't a lot of people on their own in Las Vegas. (How mundane is that, for a comment?) I purchased a few gifts that I ended up misplacing on the next day, unfortunately. I took a few photos that turned out blurry; somehow the selector of my camera was on Manual Focus... I had a gourmet dinner at Wendy's. And I walked back to the airport. It took 45 minutes. Only to find out that the 10:10 pm flight was delayed... "Est. 12:45 am". Oh well...
I walked through security at 12:15 am. I was selected for further screening. They patted me down (and didn't find the lighter in my left back pocket). They opened my bags, my computer, ran their sample pads on my jacket, on my shoes, detected explosives, ran some more sample pads on my shoes, x-rayed them again and eventually let me go. I was late by that time. I took the monorail to the gates, ran to gate D41 and boarded at the last minute. It would have been pretty ironic to miss that one. I arrived in Boston 9 hours after schedule. And my suitcase had made it.
I'm back in Boston for 3 months. Yay!
Sunday, 31. December 2006, 12:42:50
home life, parents, travel
Here's my folks' estimations of how many kilometers I flew in 2006:
- My dad opened at 20,000 km (12,400 mi)
- My mum started at 3,000 km (1,800 mi) and seeing my face changed to 12,000 km (7,500 mi)
- My brother volunteered 15,000 km (9,300 mi)
When my mum started at 3,000 km, I thought about the 4,800 km (3,000 mi) I spent in a car in NZ in 2004.
I flew almost 82000 km (51,000 mi).
I'm bad at estimating distances myself, mind you.
Friday, 8. December 2006, 04:49:32
work, travel, Boston MA
One week left and then I travel back to France. Living in Boston is fun. I drank more caramel macchiatos and cafe' mochas than I hoped I would, I didn't have any pretzel and I didn't post as many photos to flickr as I had hoped I would. I had very good clam chowders and got to try the Stata Center ping pong table just 2 days ago.
I really had a *wonderful* time, and I wish I can return soon.
When I think there is just one week left, I feel like diving on the bed, burying my face in a pillow, and pretend that this truth does not exist. This reference is from the movie "The Science of Sleep". The main character breaks into his neighbour's apartment and she shows up so unexpectedly that he just dives on her bed, hides his face in her pillow and asks her to pretend she doesn't see him.
Tuesday, 21. November 2006, 05:03:38
travel, work, Boston MA
Happy thanksgiving, folks!
I'm off for a few days to experience my first Thanksgiving celebration. And I have to earn it by waking up at 5 am tomorrow, taking a flight, and being driven (and maybe drive) for about 3 hours.
Then I'll travel again, for work. Next Saturday. Through Chicago and to Tokyo. I've been there already 3 years ago, it doesn't seem so long ago, though.
And the week after I'm back in Boston for 10 days.
I'd like it if time just stopped, in fact. Right now would be good, since I'm going to bed in a few minutes ;)
Thursday, 14. September 2006, 09:05:40
travel, life, work
Because of:
- "starbucks coffee caramel macchiato"
- "the ping-pong table at the Stata"
- "Ralph's pretzel jar"
- "clam chowder"
I am moving to Boston. Mmm... caramel macchiato, pretzels :)
I'll visit for 3 months and I'm leaving tomorrow evening. I'll be a visiting scholar at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. In effect, nothing will change but my physical location.
This will be so much fun! I'm really looking forward to it.
