Hello again, F'Talker, here are many of my recent thrills and chills and peak moments. I am numbering each section in case anyone wants to comment.

1. A leisurely visit through IAD where many rolls of film are painstakingly examined

I didn't want my rolls of film to go through too many x-ray machines so I asked them to be hand examined. I had put them in clear cannisters in a clear plastic bag, just for this exigency.

A supervisor had to come over. Many people flowing slowly and painfully through security while supervisor 1 and supervisor 2 come over.

Then I am sent to the Special Desk. Shoes off, please. Why? You aren't picking on me special, are you, just because I want my film hand examined? No. Strictly routine.

Now I sit back and the nice gentleman takes one roll of film out of its clear cannister, wipes it with the magic paper, puts the magic paper in the machine, waits for the results, then puts the film back into its clear cannister. This takes 1 or 2 minutes.

"Why not wipe all of them, then if there is a positive, separately wipe each of them in that case? If there is no positive, this saves a lot of time and money," I was afraid to ask, but I did, and he said that this is simply policy. "Someone the other day had 84 rolls that I had to do this way," he said. He was very nice, actually, and only complained that I didn't have more film because this was a fairly enjoyable activity in which to engage prior to his lunchbreak.

Gasp!! The UA flight to AMS!!!!!!
Upgraded in advance to business. No preflight drinks. Harried staff.

Dinner good except for a "pate" appetizer that did not make the usual high standard mark.

All FAs disappear for hours, gather and gab around the galley. Breakfast is served, an excellent fruit plate.

Immigration and customs in Schipol are a breeze. No forms to fill out! Oh, this simple-minded Dutch, how can they ever expect to control their borders without myriad forms and nasty questions.

We lugged our suitcases (first off the carousel -- those Priority Tags mean something to those Schipolians!) to the train station.

3. Train ride to Novotel -- a clue about smoking

The train said "no smoking" all over the place (verboden de roken, something like that, plus in several other languages in case your Dutch is a bit rusty) but there were ashtrays all over the train. This is typical in Amsterdam. It doesn't bother me (in fact I like the freedom and peace of letting people do their own thang) but all over Holland (or at least Amsterdam where we were) people smoke everywhere, like chimneys, and the signs and portents telling you not to (there aren't many) are not taken even a mite seriously.

We exited the train at RAI stop, on the outskirts of Amsterdam, near the places that businesspersons like to congregate, and checked into Holland's biggest hotel, Novotel (drumroll) with over five hundred rooms.

Despite this plethora of rooms, we checked in quickly and our rooms were clean, comfortable and reasonably quiet.

We took the #4 tram from near the hotel and headed into the Centre.

4. Van Gogh and Gauguin
Transportation in Amsterdam consists of trams, buses and foot. Everyone who lives there rides their bikes. Bikes are everywhere, thousands of them, millions of them. The "Park 'n' Ride" at a train station is a "Ride 'n' Ride" with billions of bikes chained together or to trees or people or whatever's handy.

We got these tickets good for 16 tram or bus rides for some ridiculously little price. We walked all over and trammed and bussed.

One day we went to the Rijksmuseum (sp?) and another time we went to the Van Gogh museum. We saw the most awesome exhibit documenting Gauguin's and Van Gogh's relationship through their art. This is worth flying to Amsterdam just to see although recently I believe the exhibit was in Chicago. Poor Van Gogh, things didn't work out so well for him and he cut off part of his ear (no mention of sending it to his girlfriend, not sure he had one.) The paintings are so moving, and comparing the depth and pathos and feeling you get from a Van Gogh to the mastery of Gauguin is quite a contrast.

I especially love the painting of the room in the "Yellow House." A bed, a chair, somehow so moving and magnificent. Another painting of his chair and Gauguin's chair were also indescribable and special.

We also saw Rembrandts including of course Nachtwacht (sp?). There is a reason that Rembrandt is held in such awe as one of the greatest painters. These paintings (and others there too) are incredibly moving.

In between we walked around (oh no, took a turn and there were the women in the windows, eek the red light district), had the most incredible chocolates (Unlimted Delicious I think it was called) ever, and visited relatives of a brother-in-law for dinner.

(Meanwhile, everyone smoked and rode bikes.)

5. Dinner with new friends
The taxi drivers were the friendliest people, cheerful and upbeat. We took a taxi to our new friend's house on the outskirts of the city not far from our hotel and chatted with the driver. Everyone in Amsterdam speaks twelve languages including of course French, Italian, Ibonian, Dutch, Flemish (just kidding), Belgian Waffleease, English, English, German, and English.

This makes it easy to get around if you speak English, but hard to learn any Dutch because the Dutch just answer you back in whatever language you speak and there you have it.

Anyhoo, the driver brought us to our new friend's house and we had a lovely dinner. The girl took our girl to her scouts' meeting, where apparently they discussed movies and boys, and our son played with their boy (Playstation 2). Ahh, boys will be boys and girls girls, won't they be, ehh? Meanwhile the big people talked and our new friends spoke good English of course, so us stupid Americans could understand them.

The next day we did the obligatory canal ride and Sunday we went back to Schipol and hopped to London Stansted.

6. London on US$700 per day (Warning -- contains obscene and offensive language, may not be suitable for FlyerTalkers)

Stansted is an easy airport and a very nice gentleman aboard the KLM flight told me how to get to where we were staying, so we found this pretty easy. A person sitting in front of us consulted with him and together they provided us perfect directions involving only one train and two tube transfers, and perhaps less than 2,000 steps that we had to haul fourteen bags on because they have no working escalators, no working lifts, and antiquated stations (try being disabled in London, yeah right).

The Stansted Express takes you through the prettiest neighborhoods (irony) and eventually we ended up at the Knightsbridge Green, with only two hernias between us. Why didn't we take the train to Liverpool Street and then just hop a cab? I am trying to build muscles so this was a shortcut to having a good body, and that is why we hauled the bags through the Underground, okay?

The Knightsbridge Green is a lovely hotel right on Knightsbridge around the corner from Brompton and Harrods. If you like small, quiet places, this is it. It has about 20 rooms or so, and is the precise opposite of the Amsterdam Novotel. They are very friendly and the location is fantastic, right across from Hyde Park and next to the Knightsbridge tube station, near Piccadily etc. I recommend this hotel mightily and it is not really too expensive.

But the rest of London, well...

Thinking about where we ate, family of four, two adults and two kids...all converted into US$

$90 for a lunch in a BAR

$36 for a CHEAP greasy spoon breakfast

$120 for a dinner where only two of us had entrees

Okay, and we went to the theatre every night, buying at the half price TKTS booth in Leicester Square.

We did not take a single taxi, riding the tube or bus everywhere.

Theatre tickets $120
Hotel, two rooms, $300
Crummy meals, $200
Transportatation $15
Miscellaneous $50

It all adds up. The food wasn't anything that great. We ate Chinese, Indian, English, and Miscellaneous. We even had an American meal with friends at a "50s style" place where we ate grass-fed Irish beef "cheeseburgers." The beer was good.

There are a lot of homeless people too, some of whom camp out in the Underground. Not as many as in Washington DC but you can see it is the beginning of a problem.

Many of the people we met and spoke with were tense and unhappy. A few lived a zillion miles out from London and commuted on train, tube, and bus, just to get to work. I found it quite dirty compared to how I remembered it and not a bit relaxed (haven't been to London in 25 years, what do I expect?)

7. Little jaunts

Visited the British Museum ($25). The mummies and the 2000 year old "Lindow Man" are worth the trip. Don't miss the huge exhibit of reliefs taken from the Parthenon. I have never seen statuary of this quality before.

Another day we took a train out to Cambridge ($75 for the train). Cambridge was very interesting. Went into Saint John's Chapel ($12) which is awesome. It was built around the fifteenth century and is a striking example of fan arches that support the structure and give your eyes a treat. The Rubens (something about the Magi I believe) that is usually displayed there was closed for Easter for some reason.

Walked around a lot, had a lousy snack ($35) and trained back to London.

Another day, visited Greenwich and the Maritime Museum (normally they charge but it was free, perhaps because of the lateness of the time of day). Very nice, and I wish we had seen the Observatory but we got there a little late in the day.

We walked through Hyde Park ($2 for a cup of coffee) in the morning.

Piccadilly and Leicester are very, very crowded and I don't really like those areas much. Went by the Parliament building and saw Big Ben etc. but did not go in. Too crowded, burned out on the huge number of tourists and the high cost.

We visited the Tower of London but walked around but did not wait in the long line to go inside.

One highlight was the theatre:

Woman in Black -- marvelous and scary two-person play, really engaging and well-written and acted. The guy in front of us screamed, and lots of people screamed and then laughed at their fright.

Art -- superb, funny and with a message, well-written, fantastic acting. Deservedly very popular. See it if you can. The story is about three friends, one of whom spends 200,000 francs on a painting that is only a white canvas. Much more than about art, really more about life and right on.

Julius Caesar -- Royal Shakespeare Company is awesome, what an experience. They make a real effort to entertain in this mass media day and age. The actors are incredible, they make the play so alive. This production casts Caesar as a baddie. The only negative was seeing Caesar in his thong underwear, why did they have to do that?

Kiss Me Kate-- sat in the FRONT ROW. Shook hands with the conductor (loved his enthusiasm). Saw every drop of sweat and spittle, the actors are REAL PEOPLE and you have to admire their professionalism. This production is tops (brilliant as the British say) and I recommend it highly, the highlight of our London trip. The Cole Porter music and the dancing and singing is stunning. The story is lightweight but who cares?


8. The Incident in Dis Skys

So onward on the Piccadily line to Heathrow and through United's process. We visited the SAS Business Class club and it was completely empty with excellent beverages, Internet computers, friendly staff. There is a smoking lounge if you like to smoke. We tried to get into the Thai Airways Royal Orchid lounge but it was closed.

Time to board. Uh oh, a couple with a baby (not quite a toddler, not an infant anymore either) and they bring in about three huge cases full of baby stuff. The wife kneels at the baby's feet until take-off.

I have kids myself. Some of my best friends were or are kids. I traveled with my kids on Continental First Class once, trans continental when they were perhaps 4 and 5, and I have a lot of sympathy for the situation.

So hours go by and the kid is screaming his head off. They are seated at the bulkhead just before the F cabin. People are trying to sleep, busiensspeople. Rather than let the kid scream and tire himself out, they try to soothe him and he screams and stops, screams and stops.

The husband asks my wife sitting across to shut her shade so baby can sleep. Ha ha. Screaming, screaming. About 30% of the time the baby was screaming.

Hours more go by. Finally I got up and told them that they had made me angry. They should have sat in coach. Nothing to do about it now, but I wanted to get it off my chest. That upset them greatly. Mister told me they had every right to sit here. I agreed that they did, and I had every right to tell them how I feel about it.

Mister called the FA over and complained about me. The pilot comes back and few minutes later and speaks to the mister. The FAs were no longer nice to me. They had disappeared anyway, gabbing in the galley for hours, so that wasn't a great loss.

I felt stress and tension palpably in the air. It was hard for me to tell these people how I felt, but on the other hand, they did in fact remove baby from the cabin for almost the entire remainder of the flight. I wasn't expecting any good to come out of it, but it did.

So what would you do? My wife said she overheard a businessperson who said he was just getting to sleep when baby screamed, and I know that everyone in that cabin felt as I did.

I view Business Class as a good restaurant. I don't complain when kids in McDonalds scream their head off, but in a good restaurant, when we had babies and they made lots of noise we left. We did not inflict screaming baby on others. These people were thoughtless and inconsiderate. I got it off my chest. I didn't feel better, but it actually had an effect. Perhaps I am stupid and immature about this, just relating my feelings and the facts.

So there are some observations on my trip to Amsterdam and London.

I hope you will share your comments with me. Thank you.



[This message has been edited by richard (edited 03-30-2002).]