The Road to Dushanbe

I don't think most of my posts will be this long, but this is the story of how we got to where we are and I felt I had to do it justice. **Due to road work in front of our house in Dushanbe, there will be no internet for some time so pictures will have to come later.



As you know, Dushanbe is on the other side of the world in the middle of nowhere, (even the Russians called it the end of the world, and they have Siberia), so it's no mean feat getting there. For the most part our trip went smoothly and we had a lot of fun. Here's the skinny on how it went down...



The first leg of our journey took us from Dulles airport in DC to Frankfurt, Germany. For the most part, the trip was uneventful - perhaps too much so. While the flight crew was very pleasant, everything else about the journey was not. It was hot on the plane - I was actually sweating - and there were no air blowers on the ceiling, so sleep wasn't really an option. And then to pour salt on the wound, the only in-flight entertainment was the Hannah Montana movie. Seriously, I can't imagine that more than a few percent of passengers on international flights are girls under the age of 15 - so I don't know who in their right mind would subject the remaining hundreds of non-under-15-year-old-girl passengers to Hannah Montana. Usually, I'll watch movies that I'm totally uninterested in on a plane just to pass the time, but a man has to draw the line somewhere.



So we arrived at Frankfurt airport, unslept and gross, and had to schlep all the way across the airport, and go through two security checkpoints, (even though we never left the terminal), before we reached our gate, which looked like an airplane hangar with a few chairs in it. Sitting there, the time for our boarding call came and went, and the screen suddenly showed a flight that wasn't ours. So Stephanie asked an unfriendly airline employee who told us the gate changed (no announcement) and directed us up a set of stairs that led to a locked door, out of which came and angry security guard who sent us back the long way around to our correct gate. Fortunately the flight was late and we didn't miss it.



About 2 hours later we landed in Istanbul for 3 days of beautiful weather and sightseeing. Our hotel was a converted Ottoman mansion in the historic district, about a 5 minute walk from the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque. I'll save the story of our trip to Istanbul for when I can upload pictures along with it, but we had a fantastic time and a much needed chance to recharge on our journey.



Finally it was time to head on to the final leg of our trip from Istanbul to Dushanbe. It was sort of the opposite of the first, with a frustrating airport process, but a delightful flight. We arrived at the airport with 2.5 hours to spare before our flight. At the airport, we carried our enormous quantity of luggage, (we had to pack for at least 1 month), through a long line only to have the woman at the Turkish Air check-in counter tell us that since their system didn't show us as originating in the US (different airline) that our baggage weight allowance was 40 pounds less than what it was when we left DC. She procedeed to send us to stand in a different line to pay a hefty overweight baggage fee (fortunately we should be able to cover the cost).



At this other line, we had to take a number (like at a deli but with no food). We were number 121 and we waited while they served number 84 for about 10 minutes. Since we now were down to about an hour before our flight, that wasn't going to work. So I went to the business class line that had no one in it and paid. From there, we stood in line for passport control next to a sobbing Chinese family for about 30 minutes before we got through to the gates. The gate on the screen was different from the gate on our boarding pass so we had to walk a bit further then we expected (at least it was sans humongous suitcases). Then, once we reached our gate, they changed it two more times, moving it farther and farther, before they ran out of airport (we were literally at the farthest edge from where we started).



The boarding procedure was a bit of a mad dash. The guy in the seat next to ours had also stolen all the pillows and was sitting on them. Stephanie stole one when he stood up for a moment, but I convinced her to give it back - I didn't want to sit next to an angry dude for 5.5 hours - not to mention that they pillow had been sat on already. Many passengers kept getting up and moving their bags from one overhead compartment to another and just generally walking around like it was Central Park on Saturday instead of an airplane. Finally, most people were sitting, but this one woman didn't like her seat and sat in the row behind us in a seat reserved for an airplane technician. There were 3 crew members trying (politely) to get her to move and the situation was only resolved because the pillow hog next to us agreed to switch seats with her.



From there it was pretty much hunky-dory. There was enough leg room to dance in, the in-flight entertainment was fine (Everybody Loves Raymond, Zoo Babies (baby elephants are impossible not to watch) and Wolverine), and they gave us little menus with the food and drink choices - which was outstanding by airline standards and would have been decent even in a restaurant.



We landed in Dushanbe at 3:30 am (30 min late thanks to the seat hopper), and I got to use some Russian right away to make sure the bus we got on was going to baggage claim and not to Kyrgyzstan - one never knows. There were expediters who helped us get through customs quickly and after not too long of a wait, we had our luggage and were picked up by an embassy driver and our social sponsor.



We finally got to our house around 5am. It's even better than it looked in the pictures, and is enormous. Instead of catching a few hours of sleep, we spent the rest of the night exploring the huge basement, finding new rooms, and playing with the ultra-modern shower. It's a little funky and a lot of fun. Again, once we have internet at home, pictures will follow.

I'll continue the story of our first days in Dushanbe in another post, but wanted to get this started...