Random comment about this airport... it has amusing announcements for when passengers are late for their plane, something along the lines of "passenger x you are delaying your flight, please report to gate y immediately or we will offload your luggage" now this is all said in a sing song robotic English, similar to the robot from Portal, which is not the effect I think they were going for. *smiles* Also, I think that it is probably am empty threat anyway, how are they going to find your luggage in the hold that quickly to offload anyway?
Now that I've been in the airport for while, it's quite a nice place, as airports go. There are lots of seats, comfortable ones at that, and television screens setup to watch the Olympics. It also has a small art exhibition for people to look at, which was nice. I quite like the Dutch artwork from the Golden Age. The detail in the brushwork and the use of light just mesmerises me. Not to mention heaps of shops, though a lot of them repeat themselves throughout the complex. I haven't been tempted to buy anything yet though...
Showing posts with label Airport. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Airport. Show all posts
Monday, August 11, 2008
Airports. Peh.
I am currently sitting at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam with not much to do. Now some of this is my fault as I forgot to bring any EUR with me and don't feel like exchanging any of my USD or CDF, so I can't buy food, which I don't really mind as I'm not hungry and it's overpriced anyway. And I also forgot to grab a book to read from the Australian apartment this morning. But I did bring my knitting with me, which I had started up again in preparation for knitting on the plane to Chicago and here.
However, in Geneva Airport, they decided that my bright yellow plastic 5mm diameter knitting needles were too dangerous to be taken on a plane and confiscated them off me. Plastic! I bet you some of the pens in my pencil case could cause more damage than those needles! I was not happy, particularly since I had gotten them through Melbourne and Singapore airport a month ago and had checked the American travel security agency webpage which said I could take them on. But everybody knows that you can't argue with security personnel, particularly the fastidious Swiss kind who only seemed to speak French, so I pulled the needles out of the my knitting and sat down.
Thinking about it now, I should have been more prepared and put in a safety row, brought a book and some of the local currency of my transfer airport, but I always forget the prepare for the travel in my worry about the trip. To make matter worse, you have to pay for internet at this airport, so I will be back dating this later.
*sigh* Now that I've got all those complaints off my chest, I will tell you all about why I'm actually here in the first place. I am off to the Hadron Collider Physics Summery School, which is being help at FermiLab, which is an hour west of Chicago. It starts tomorrow and goes until next Friday. I have looked at the timetable for it, and it is very full, unlike some other schools, but we get a day off on Sunday to go look around Chicago, which should be good. After Chicago, I'm going to visit my family and friends in Los Angeles for a couple of days before heading back to Geneva. I've bought a fair bit of Swiss chocolate for everybody, and am really hoping that it'll last until I see them. If is doesn't, I am really sorry and will be blaming the mid-west weather. *grins*
However, in Geneva Airport, they decided that my bright yellow plastic 5mm diameter knitting needles were too dangerous to be taken on a plane and confiscated them off me. Plastic! I bet you some of the pens in my pencil case could cause more damage than those needles! I was not happy, particularly since I had gotten them through Melbourne and Singapore airport a month ago and had checked the American travel security agency webpage which said I could take them on. But everybody knows that you can't argue with security personnel, particularly the fastidious Swiss kind who only seemed to speak French, so I pulled the needles out of the my knitting and sat down.
Thinking about it now, I should have been more prepared and put in a safety row, brought a book and some of the local currency of my transfer airport, but I always forget the prepare for the travel in my worry about the trip. To make matter worse, you have to pay for internet at this airport, so I will be back dating this later.
*sigh* Now that I've got all those complaints off my chest, I will tell you all about why I'm actually here in the first place. I am off to the Hadron Collider Physics Summery School, which is being help at FermiLab, which is an hour west of Chicago. It starts tomorrow and goes until next Friday. I have looked at the timetable for it, and it is very full, unlike some other schools, but we get a day off on Sunday to go look around Chicago, which should be good. After Chicago, I'm going to visit my family and friends in Los Angeles for a couple of days before heading back to Geneva. I've bought a fair bit of Swiss chocolate for everybody, and am really hoping that it'll last until I see them. If is doesn't, I am really sorry and will be blaming the mid-west weather. *grins*
Friday, July 4, 2008
Singapore Stopover
So I'm currently in Singapore's Changi Airport, waiting 3 hours in between an 8 hours flight from Melbourne and a 12 hour flight to Zurich. The first flight wasn't too bad, my supervisor and I where placed in the centre of the four seats in the middle of the plane, which mean climbing over people to get out, but luckily I was sitting next to another fairly slim girl. It was an older plane, which was evident from the entertainment system, which had audio/video on demand, but was not very responsive. I used the time on the flight to catch up on some sleep and recent chick flicks and watched 27 Dresses and How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days. I liked the former better since I don't like watching people making a fool of themselves.
The airport here is very pretty, see above, the bathrooms look like they belong in a five star hotel, there are plants and water features everywhere, heaps of yummy food and free wireless internet. *grins* Oh, and there are cute little trolleys to use to push around your hand luggage, which is great, since my backpack is fairly heavy with all my electronics. It is a little humid here though, since I don't think they want to waste too much electricity on air conditioning during the night. The security is set up differently than in Melbourne though, where you go through customs then security, then find your gate and only show your boarding pass just before boarding the plane, here you only go through customs before the shops, then each couple of gates have their own security areas, where they also scan your boarding pass, so the gate is just a holding area for people before boarding, which is where I need to go now...
The airport here is very pretty, see above, the bathrooms look like they belong in a five star hotel, there are plants and water features everywhere, heaps of yummy food and free wireless internet. *grins* Oh, and there are cute little trolleys to use to push around your hand luggage, which is great, since my backpack is fairly heavy with all my electronics. It is a little humid here though, since I don't think they want to waste too much electricity on air conditioning during the night. The security is set up differently than in Melbourne though, where you go through customs then security, then find your gate and only show your boarding pass just before boarding the plane, here you only go through customs before the shops, then each couple of gates have their own security areas, where they also scan your boarding pass, so the gate is just a holding area for people before boarding, which is where I need to go now...
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